The slavery of the British West India colonies delineated, as it exists both in law and practice, and compared with the slavery of other countries, ancient and modern

THE

SLAVERY

OF THE

BRITISH WEST INDIA COLONIES

DELINEATED,

AS IT EXISTS

BOTH IN LAW AND PRACTICE,

AND COMPARED WITH

THE SLAVERY OF OTHER COUNTRIES, ANTIENT
AND MODERN.

By JAMES STEPHEN, Esq.

VOL. IL

BEING A ©ELllJEATlON OF THE STATE IN POINT OF PRACTICE.

LONDON
PRINTED FOR SAUNDERS AND BENNING,

(successors to J. EUTTERWORTH AND SON,)

43, fleet-street;
AND J. HATCHARD AND SON, 187, PICCADILLY.

1830.

TO
THE KING S MOST EXCELLENT MAJESTY.

Sire,

In humbly dedicating this volume to your Ma-
jesty, without having asked your gracious permission
to do so, I am, perhaps, departing from ordinary
rules ; but if so, it is from no want of confidence in
your royal condescension and benignity, qualities
which have preeminently distinguished your Ma-
jesty from the first moment of your reign, and added
to the high sentiment of loyalty, that of personal at-
tachment, in the hearts of your faithful subjects. It
is because, from peculiar considerations in a case of
no ordinary kind, I think it more consistent with
feelings of the most dutiful and profound respect
towards your Majesty, to invoke publicly your
royal attention to a work on the subject of colonial
slavery, without presuming to ask for your consent.

The unfortunate and anomalous situation of a
large class of your Majesty's subjects, of whom I am
a feeble advocate, recommends their cause in a pe-
culiar manner, to the audience and protection of the

DEDICATION.

throne. Over a large proportion of them your Ma-
jesty is the immediate and sole legislator ; and all
are destitute of any such share in the formation of
the laws by which they are governed, as the other
subjects of these United Kingdoms directly or in-
directly enjoy in both Houses of Parliament. Their
legislative influence exists in the heart of the Sove-
reign alone.

JVor have they that important resort, when ag-
grieved, either m the formation or administration of
the laws, which their free fellow-subjects possess.
They cannot state their wrongs or their sufferings
by petitions, even to the common father of his
people. They have no public voice ; or none to
which they dare give utterance.

To the generous feelings of your Majesty, these
disabilities will become motives for listening, with
patient and favourable attention, to a voluntary ad-
vocate of that helpless class, comprising near a mil-
lion of your Majesty's subjects, who was long an
eye-witness of their calamitous situation, and now
desires to lay at the foot of your throne, a full ac-
count of it, supported by what will be found decisive
evidence, for your Majesty's compassionate con-
sideration.

It is their great further misfortune, especially that
of the agricultural slaves, whose general lot is by
far more severe than that of the domestics, that
their situation and treatment are known, for the most
part, only to those who have a deep interest in con-
cealing all that is most oppressive in them from
European minds, and exhibiting in a fallacious

DEDICATION. 1»

view every real or pretended mitigation. It is not
distance of position only that gives facility to such
deceptions ; for the nature of the system makes the
discovery of its worst practical abuses extremely dif-
ficult, even on the spot, except to its immediate
administrators, or persons long resident among them.
Those oppressions, especially of the plantation slaves,
which are at once the most general and most per-
nicious, the excess of their forced labour, and the
insufficiency of their sustenance, are easily con-
cealed from transient visitors ; and can be estimated
only by those who have seen them at all hours and
seasons ; and have been enabled to examine, in its
details, the interior economy of the plantations.

To lay open these sources of error, and remove
the misconceptions that have arisen from them in
many upright and intelligent minds, have been
leading objects in the work which I have now the
honour humbly to present to your Majesty. For
those purposes I have found it necessary to review
the evidence given before Parliament near forty
years ago, by some distinguished public characters,
chiefly officers of high rank in the naval and military
services, who had visited the colonies ; and some of
whom had been long on the West India station :
not certainly with a view to impeach tbe sincerity of
their opinions, or the respectability of their judg-
ments ; but, on the contrary, to shew that even
such men, eminent though some of them were for
their talents, as well as illustrious from their public
services, were unable to avoid those errors into which
strangers of distinction are led, when they form

iv DKD1C4T10N,

opinions of slavery from what is permitted to meet
their eyes and ears, while honoured guests in the
islands.

The distant date of such testimony did not allow
me to leave it unnoticed, as it is still cited by some
of the colonial opponents to whom I had to reply.
In fact, they have none more recent, of the same
high character, to cite. But its age also constitutes
its pre-eminent value, in the use to which I now ap-
ply it ; because, in reference to the period at which
that evidence was given, there is no longer any doubt
or denial of facts, which prove that those much re-
spected witnesses were, in the favourable accounts
they gave of slavery, very widely deceived.

Should your Majesty have the condescension to
read what I have written on this subject, from the
twentieth to the forty-sixth page of this volume, you
will find that the defence now maintained on the
part of the sugar colonies, is quite inconsistent with
that which their agents formerly called those gallant
officers and others to support ; and amounts, in effect,
to a repudiation of their honest but erroneous tes-
timony.

The assemblies, and the planters at large, have
been driven by subsequent investigations, and by the
admissions of writers of their own party, to confess
that the state of slavery at that period was quite
indefensible ; and what they now desire us to be-
lieve, on the faith of evidence taken by themselves
in the colonies, and on the assertions of their ac-
credited public apologists, is that the case has since
been altered, or rather reversed, Instead of still

DEDICATION.

maintaining that the slaves, at the era of the par-
liamentary examinations, were treated with the ut-
most tenderness and liberality, as their witnesses
then asserted, they admit, in effect, that the treat-
ment was then as negligent, sordid, and severe,
as abolitionists alleged. They acknowledge that
cruelties in punishment were then frequent, and that
the laws afforded no protection against them ; that
the preservation of their numbers by native increase,
was no object of solicitude with their masters, and
that the frightful decrease in population was, in
a great measure, imputable to avaricious oppression
and neglect. One eminent planter and colonial
apologist. Dr. Collins, has since expressly admitted,
that inanition and famine, combined with severe
labour, were very frequent causes of mortality among
the plantation slaves, speaking of the same times in
which the respectable witnesses I have alluded to,
thought their labour remarkably light, and their
sustenance abundant.

Some of the present admissions, on the highest
colonial authority, bring the condemnation of the
former case much further down. They date the
very commencement of humanity in the treatment of
slaves, and care of their preservation, from the abo-
lition of the slave trade in 1807 ; and ascribe it to the
influence of that measure on the minds of the masters.

If the new defence, however inconsistent with the
old, were founded in truth ; if the alleged subsequent
improvements were real, and such as to satisfy, in a
reasonable degree, the demands of justice and hu-
manity, these remarks would be less worthy of your

VI DEDICATION.

Majesty's attention. But I have shown in this work,
that the policy of casting back on past times, all that
is most reproachful in the system, and taking credit
thereby for alleged reformations, is by no means
new ; and that the present iteration of it has no just
claim to confidence.

Could I hope that my delineation of slavery
throughout, as contained in the present and former
volume, would be honoured with a perusal by your
Majesty, I should not doubt that the result would be
a conviction in your royal mind, that the alleged
improvements are, for the most part, fictitious or
illusory. In respect, at least, of the grand econo-
mical oppressions of excessive labour, and inade-
quate maintenance, I have shown that the case is
not materially altered, by what, I trust, will be found
irrefragable proofs. If not, it must be because, not
merely the enemies of the system, but its friends,
apologists, and administrators, are supposed to have
concurred in defaming it ; for I have relied upon
the evidence on the colonial side alone.

I humbly submit, on the whole, to your Majesty's
judgment, that the state of slavery in the colonies,
which I have delineated, both in point of law and
practice, is not more inconsistent with the character
of that free and happy constitution over which your
Majesty has the happiness and glory to preside, than
repugnant to the clearest dictates of religion, justice,
and humanity ; and such as ought no longer to be
maintained or tolerated within your Majesty's do-
minions.

That your Majesty's life may be prolonged, with

DEDICATION. Vll

every public and private blessing, long after the aged
subject, who has now the honour to address you,
shall be called to his account before the King of
Kings, and that among the felicities and glories of
your reign, may be our deliverance from the guilt
and reproach of colonial slavery, is the ardent wish
and prayer of

Sire,

Your Majesty's faithful and devoted

Servant and Subject

JAMES STEPHEN.

Pages ix-x omitted in numberi

ng.

PREFACE.

The hope of engaging at this critical and arduous
juncture of political affairs, so large a portion of the
time of British statesmen and legislators, as would
be necessary for the perusal of the work 1 now offer
to the public, may seem idle and presumptuous ;
yet for their use chiefly it has been composed.

Why it was not sooner finished and published, is
partly explained in my introductory chapter ; and if
the apologies there made are not thought sufficient,
let me here claim the indulgence due to the infirmi-
ties of age. The composition of a work like this
becomes laborious, in proportion as memory, in the
promptness of its suggestions, declines ; and my sight
also having, during the last two or three years, been
greatly impaired, the task of keeping up, in my
reading, with the rapid growth of information and
discussion in a voluminous public controversy, has
been more than, consistently with official and private
duties, I could easily sustain.

The best evidence of my own sincere persuasion,
that such a work was wanted, is that I have at all,
though feebly and tardily, surmounted those impedi-

XU PREFACE.

ments, by a great sacrifice of personal ease, the en-
joyment which age is most covetous of, and finds it
hardest to relinquish.

The peculiar plan of my work is that, which in
my own view constitutes its chief, or whole, im-
portance ; and gives me the hope of its being useful
to the great cause ihat I advocate, with enlightened
and influential minds.

Of all the difficulties with which public men, per-
sonally strangers to the West India colonies, are em-
barrassed by the anti-slavery question, the greatest,
I believe, is that of ascertaining on what premises of
fact they can safely rely ; and there can be no pos
sible means of removing this difficulty so effectual as
the singular plan which I have adopted, that of
reasoning wholly e.v concessis, and establishing every
fact that I adduce by the evidence of my opponents
alone.

A work constructed on such principles, neither
asks nor needs any confidence in its author. It
might have been published anonymously, without
impairing its effect : except that it would have been
less likely to obtain public attention, on a subject
which has not the attraction of novelty; and on
which those who read, not for entertainment merely,
but instruction, too generally, though very errone-
ously, suppose they have nothing still to learn.

This consideration, however, is of great and fearful
importance to the cause of the unfortunate slaves.
Though the inherent force of truth has, at length,
made its way through all the entrenchments of con-
troversial falsehood, and nothing is wanting to insure

PREFACE. XllJ

the victory of humanity and justice, but to turn
the artillery of the adverse host upon themselves ;
though a watchful advocate of reformation now sees
his way to full success, in a review of the evidence
opposed to him ; one formidable obstacle intervenes :
— it is the satiety of his audience: — it is the diffi-
culty of being heard.

To lessen, if possible, this disadvantage, I have
taken a course not very pleasant to a man who loves
peace, and sincerely dislikes publicity, that of
affixing my name to the work ; for it is one fair
claim to attention, that the author is known to be
well acquainted with his subject; and when I pledge
myself, as I here confidently do, that the views I
have now to open on the state of colonial slavery
are, in great measure, new to the public, — new, at
least, in their systematic combination, and the
strong species of demonstration with which they are
accompanied ; and new, also, as to the details of the
general oppressions they describe, many, perhaps,
from curiosity, if not from higher motives, will take
the trouble to satisfy themselves whether that pledge,
from a man well versed in the long-depending con-
troversy, has been forfeited or redeemed.

But will there not be a counterpoise to this be-
nefit, in adverse prepossessions, which the author's
name may excite ? Not, I humbly hope, with men
of intelligence and penetration ; for though I ask no
confidence, I am unconscious of any thing that can
fairly expose me to suspicion or distrust.

I have, indeed, been long and loudly railed
against, as an enemy of the sugar colonies, and a

XIV PREFACE.

man intent on their destruction ; but public men well
know, from experience, how to estimate party-
spirited invectives like these. They mean only that
my views of the sources of prosperity and mischief
to the planters, are, and always have been, dia-
metrically opposite to their own ; that I was an early
and determined enemy to the slave-trade, which
they long held vital to their welfare; and, an enemy
not less determined, of that interior system which, in
their eyes, is prosperity and safety, but, in mine,
perennial calamity, and closely impending ruin.
They now, virtually admit that I was their friend,
rather than their enemy, in the former case ; and,
perhaps, will one day do me the same justice in the
other.

Against some anonymous charges, less vague,
arraigning my motives and sincerity, I have already
defended myself before the public ; * and my anta-
gonists have not hazarded a reply.

There is one imputation, indeed, which, though
not ill calculated, I fear, to enlist strong prejudices
against any advocate of a cause like this, with no
small part of the community, I cannot desire to
contradict ; but rather wish, that when fairly in-
terpreted, it were true to a greater extent than it
really is. I mean the charge, mixed up with almost
every invective of my colonial enemies, that 1 am
actuated in these labours by such a zeal for Christian
doctrines and principles, as they call enthusiasm and
fanaticism ; or that I am a character, their familiar

* Sre tlie Preface to my former volume.

PREFACF.. XV

name for whicli I will not quote, because it is a most
irreverent, not to say" impious use, for derisive pur-
poses, of a scriptural term, appropriated to the ven-
erated first founders of our faith.

Far be it from me to disclaim, as motives of my
zeal, in this great cause, the fear of God, and a sense
of Christian duty ; but I will not needlessly leave
to my opponents the benefit of those prejudices to
which they craftily appeal ; and, therefore, will not
scruple to say, that if my hostility to West India
slavery were truly imputable to zeal for the peculiar
doctrines of the gospel, the effect must have pre-
ceded its cause.

When I first knew the West Indies, I was a very
young man ; and not less ignorant and regardless of
Christianity, or of all, at least, that exclusively be-
longs to it, than young men in my own sphere of
life then too generally were. I had early imbibed
such theological opinions as are commonly called
liberal ; and though religion was not wholly left out
of my scheme, either in theory or practice, it was a
religion in which not only Christians of the lowest
standard, but enlightened heathens, might have con-
curred : nor can any man be more disposed than I
then was to despise, as narrow-mindedness and
bigotry, those views which I am now supposed,
whether justly or not, to entertain. Yet I can truly
say, and appeal to my known conduct in proof of it,
that I no sooner personally knew what negro slavery
is, in its odious practice and effects, than I conceived
and avowed for it all the detestation that I at this
moment feel, regarded it as the greatest evil that

XVI PREFACE.

ever afflicted suffering humanity, and the most op-
probrious crime of my country ; and devoted my
future life, as far as was immediately possible, to
that great African cause, in which I have continued
to labour for no less than forty-seven years.

It is not true, then, that zeal for Christianity, or
what my opponents call enthusiasm in religion, made
me an enemy to slavery. It would be much nearer
the truth, for certain reasons, to say that this enmity
made me a Christian. But I know of no scheme of
religion or morals. Christian or Pagan, on which the
slavery of the sugar colonies, when truly delineated,
can admit of justification or excuse.

A fear has sometimes occurred to me while writing
on these subjects for the public, and especially when
noticing the corrupting effects of familiarity and con-
tact with the harsh system, in the minds of those
who have long resided in the colonies, that I might
seem to arrogate to myself some native superiority
to others, in having, during a residence there of eleven
years, escaped that moral contagion. Let me here,
therefore, disclaim as I sincerely can, any such vain
opinion. Most unaffectedly do I confess my belief,
that had it not pleased a gracious providence to
guard me there by singular means from the general
influence, 1 should, like others, have soon reconciled
myself to the becoming an owner of slaves, next, in
consequence, to the exercise of that odious discipline
by which they are governed, and finally, perhaps, to
the becoming a planter, and to all the abuses of the
harsh relation which 1 have delineated in the present
work. That t escaped that ordinary progress was

PREFACE. XVU

chiefly owing to a resolution formed immediately
after my first arrival in the West Indies, and in-
flexibly adhered to during my stay there, never to be
the owner of a slave. The calumnies of colonial
enemies obliged me, self-defensively, to notice this
peculiarity, in the preface to my former volume,* and
no opponent, to my knowledge, has since attempted
to contradict the facts there stated. But let me now
add to them, if not from candour and justice to others,
who have, on their emigration to lands of slavery,
guarded themselves by no such resolution, at least
in humble gratitude to an all-directing Providence,
an incident that led me happily to form it.

Like other strangers from Europe, I should pro-
bably have seen and heard little of the state and
treatment of slaves to disgust or alarm me, till too
late to adopt that precaution, but for the coincidence
of various circumstances apparently fortuitous (by a
Christian nothing should be strictly deemed such),
which gave me, immediately after my first arrival, a
view of the system more impressive and revolting
than can be easily described ; and taught me more in
a day, of its real character and effects, than those
who do not go out to reside on plantations, are likely
to learn for years, or till habit has made the disco-
very useless to them. Though destined to St. CJiris-
topher, I was led, by an acquaintance accidentally
formed, to take my passage in a ship that had pre-
viously to touch at Barbadoes, an island four degrees
of latitude out of my way, to land some passengers

* See p. 51 to 54.

a

XVlll PREFACE.

and stores there, where we arrived, after an accident
that detained us long in the Downs, in December,
1783.

A letter from a London merchant to his cor-
respondent at Bridgetown, the chief port of the
island, secured to me the hospitable reception from
him — which strangers usually meet in that part of
the world ; and the next day I met a large party at
his house, that had been invited to dine with me
there.

The principal topic of conversation at table, was
the approaching trial of four plantation slaves,
charged with the murder of a gentleman of the me-
dical profession, for which they were to be tried the
next day ; and my attention was the more excited to
the subject, by the discovery that there were among
the gentlemen in company some who strongly doubt-
ed the guilt of the prisoners, that the case was in-
volved in very mysterious circumstances, and that
public suspicion glanced at a gentleman of the
island, who had not however been prosecuted, or
publicly charged with the offence.

I learned, in answer to questions that curiosity
prompted me to put to one or more of the gentlemen
near me, what the grounds of that suspicion were ;
but 1 will not state them here, because, though forty -
seven years have since elapsed, I cannot be sure that
the indication they might furnish of the mdividual
suspected, to surviving members of the same society,
would not be injurious to him, if still in life ; or to the
feelings of his relations and friends if he is no more.
I will only say, that the suspicious circumstances

PREFACE. XIX

appeared to me pretty strong ; and that one of them
was a certain interest which he was understood to
have in the fatal event ; whereas the negroes, if
guilty, must have committed what in the West In-
dies is a crime very rarely heard of, the murder of a
white man ; and without any apparent motive.

My curiosity naturally inspired a wish to be pre-
sent at the trial, not only from these circumstances
of the case, but because I was too truly told that
slaves were tried for their offences in a very different
way from that which I nad been accustomed to wit-
ness on the trial of criminals in England ; and my
kind entertainer, therefore, was induced to accom-
pany me to the court at its sitting the next morning.

Very soon and painfully did I perceive how shock-
ing a contrast there was between the proceedings of
a slave court, and the humanity of our criminal
tribunals.

The court, consisting of a bench of justices of the
peace, five I think in number, without a jury, was no
sooner constituted, than the four black prisoners were
placed at the bar ; and as they were first common
field negroes I had seen, their filthy and scanty garbs
would have moved my pity, if it had not been more
strongly excited by the pain they were visibly suf-
fering from tight ligatures of cord round their crossed
wrists, which supplied the place of hand-cuffs. I
noticed it to my companion, and said, surely they
will be put at bodily ease during their trial ; but he
replied it was not customary. As there was no in-
dictment, or other express charge, and consequently

XX PREFACE.

no arraignment, they had not to hold up their hands ;
and remained bound in the same painful way while
I remained a spectator.

But the first proceeding of the bench, changed the
sensation of pity in my breast, into honest indigna-
tion. It was the production and reading by the
chairman of a letter received by him from a gentle-
man, who was owner of two of the prisoners, and
who had been written to with an enquiry, whether
he would choose to employ a lawyer in the defence
of his slaves ; and the answer was that he declined
to do so, adding as his reason, *' God forbid that he
" sliould wish in such a case to screen the guilty from
" 'pujiishmentr To the best of my recollection these
were the very words : I am sure such was the exact
import of the letter.

I turned with a look of astonishment to my con-
ductor ; but before I could whisper my feelings, they
were diverted from the master to the bench ; for to
my astonishment the chairman applauded the letter,
as honourable to the writer ; and the other magis-
trates concurred in his eulogy.

Strangely misplaced though I felt it to be, and
shocked though I was at such a cruel prejudication
of the unfortunate prisoners by their natural pro-
tector, I supposed that the commendation rested on
his disinterestedness, in being willing to sacrifice his
property in their bodies, without opposition to the
demands of public justice ; for I did not then know of
the laws noticed in my first volume, p. 322 to 328,
which intitle a master, on the conviction and execu-

PREFACE. XXI

tion of his slave, to be paid for his loss of property
out of the public purse. The lawyers' fees in con-
sequence would have been a profitless expense.

Not only was there no written charge, but no
opening of the case, on the part of the prosecution.
The prisoners had to learn it as I did, only from the
evidence adduced ; the uncontroverted part of which
was briefly as follows.

The deceased had been visiting a certain estate in
his usual routine as its medical attendant ; and after
seeing the patients, mounted his horse, to return to
his residence in town. A negro of the estate the
same morning brought in the horse with the saddle
and bridle on, saying that he had found it grazing
in one of the cane pieces ; and the manager there-
upon ordered it to be put into the stable ; but did
not send till the next day to give information of the
occurrence at the doctor's house; supposing, as he
alleged, that the horse by some accident had got
away from him, and would be sent for. The de-
ceased however never returned to his home; and an
alarm naturally arising, he was enquired for at the
estates he had visited ; and after consequent searches,
the body was found in a cane piece not far from the
house he had last visited, with contusions on the
head, such as a fall from his horse could not have
occasioned, and which were the apparent cause of
his death.

So far there was nothing to affect either of the
prisoners ; except that one of them, a very old negro,
was the man who brought in the horse ; and though
this was regarded as a leading circumstance of sus-

-XXll PREFACE.

picioii against him, it seemed to me of a directly op-
posite tendency.

But a negro girl, or wench, as she was called in the
ordinary style of the slave colonies, a deformed creat-
ture, apparently about fifteen years old, was next
called, as the only witness who could bring the of-
fence home, by positive testimony, to the prisoners.

Before she was examined, she was addressed by
the chairman in a way that carried my surprise and
indignation to the utmost pitch. She was admonished
in the most alarming terms, to beware not to conceal
any thing that made against the pjisoners ; and told
that if she did, she would involve herself in their
crime, and its punishment. No caution whatever was
given as to any sin or danger on the opposite side.
Every word implied a premature conviction in the
mind of the court, that the prisoners were certainly
guilty, and that she would be probably disbelieved
and punished if she said any thing tending to acquit
them. Terror was strongly depicted in her counte-
nance during this address ; and I felt at the moment
that had I been a juryman to try the prisoners on her
evidence, after such an exhortation, nothing she
might testify against them would weigh a feather in
my verdict.

As the negro dialect was new to me, I should not
have been able clearly to understand her testimony
in many parts of it, without the assistance of my com-
panion, who kindly whispered the interpretations
that I asked for ; but her story in substance was,
that the deceased rode up to the negro houses of a
plantation she belonged to, for shelter against a

PREFACE. XXlll

shower of rain ; that he alighted, and gave his horse
to one of the prisoners to hold ; and that thereupon
he and the other three, the only persons present ex-
cept herself, fell upon him with sticks, knocked him
down, and beat him to death ; and afterwards car-
ried his body to the cane piece in which it was
found.

No provocation, or other motive, was assigned by
her, and her evidence, independently of the terror
that had been impressed upon her, would have ap-
peared to me, from its matter, and the manner in
which it was given, wholly unworthy of credit.
The countenances and gesticulations of all the un-
fortunate men during her examination, impressed me
with a strong persuasion of their innocence. Never
were the workings of nature more clearly imitated
by the most expert actor on any stage, if her whole
narrative did not fill them with astonishment ; and
excite in them all the indignation that belongs to
injured innocence. I expressed that feeling strongly
to my conductor; and he dissented only by observ-
ing that negroes in general were masters of dissimula-
tion ; or something to that effect..

At the conclusion of her evidence, he reminded me
that it was time to go, as we had to meet a party at
dinner , and I was not sorry to quit the scene, for
besides the bodily sufferings, to which the foul air of
a crowded court in that hot atmosphere subjected me,
I was nearly overpowered by disgust and indignation
at what I had seen and heard.

Here, therefore, I must cease to narrate the case
from my own direct knowledge. But the sequel was

XXIV PREFACE.

well supplied to me by evidence beyond suspicion.
The same day 1 heard of what further passed on the
trial, from persons who had staid in court to the end
of it. No further evidence had fortified that of the
negro icench in any material point. On the strength
of her testimony alone, the magistrates had convicted
all the prisoners of murder.

I asked my host anxiously " do you think they
will be hanged ?" and great was my horror at the
answer, when explained to me. He supposed that
the governor would be applied to for an '* exemiplary
death.'" What, I asked, was meant by that? *' burn-
ing alive perhaps, or gibbeting/' was the reply. On
enquiring what was the meaning of the latter term, it
was explained to me to be hanging them up alive on
a gibbet, in an iron cage or hoops, and leaving them
to perish by hunger, thirst, and the other miseries of
that situation.

" And by what law are such cruelties perpetrated
within the British dominions?" He could not tell;
but it was understood the governor had a power to
order such execution of slaves in extraordinary cases.
" And did you ever know an instance of this gibbet-
" ingV *' Yes, I remember one ; but it was a long
" time ago. I was then a boy ; and can remember
" that after the man had hung many days (he was
*' above a week in dying), I and other boys threw
" up " (I forget whether he said pieces of bread or
fruit), " to the cage, which the poor wretch tried to
** catch with his mouth through the bars."

I should hardly venture to mention this fact, if like
cruelties had not been narrated by Mr. Bryan

PREFACE. XXV

Edwards and others; and if an execution precisely
of the same kind, and with a death as lingering, had
not notoriously taken place at Dominica, by order of
the then governor, while I was resident in the
Leeward Islands. Balla, the insurgent chief, was
gibbetted, close to the chief Town of Roseau ; and
being there a year or more after, I heard a particular
account of it, exactly corresponding with that of my
Barbadoes host, from several respectable gentlemen
who disapproved of the act ; but though enemies of
the governor (who was then the object of violent
popular clamour), candidly admitted that he had
been led to it by a pretty general wish of the com-
munity.*

I left Barbadoes immediately after the trial, but
heard soon after the sequel of the tragedy, from
several gentlemen who came from that Island to St.
Christopher. The court applied to the Governor,
a planter of the Island, and one who afterwards gave
a very favourable account of the general humanity of
his brethren, before the privy council, for an exemplai^y
death; and he ordered that the four convicts should
burnt alive.

But what perhaps will be thought the most singular
part of the case, remains to be told

The owner of two of the slaves, the same I believe,
who so laudably refused to employ a lawyer for them>
on hearing of the evidence on which they had been
convicted, in respect of time and place, was able to
establish a clear alibi in their favor, to the satisfaction

* See my fiibt vol. p. 309. unci the cascb there noticed.

XXVI PREFACE.

of the magistrates who had tried them ; in consequence
of which they were pardoned. But however incredi-
ble it may appear, the two other unfortunate men,
convicted on the very same evidence, nevertheless
underwent the cruel fate to which they were sen-
tenced. They were literally burnt alive at Bridge-
town.

Among the persons there at the time, whose in-
formation, within a short time after, confirmed to me
these concluding particulars, was the late Charles
Sturt, Esq. afterwards member of parliament for
Bridport. He was then Lieutenant of the Falcon
Sloop of War, which came down soon after the exe-
cution, from Barbadoes to St. Christopher; and
being a friend of mine, he answered my enquiries on
the subject very freely; confirming that extraordinary
fact which I had found it difficult to believe, the
ground on which two of the prisoners had been spared,
and which nevertheless had not saved the others from
a dreadful death. " I had not," he added, " the
'* heart to witness the execution myself; but several
" of our officers and people did ; and the account of
" it they gave when they returned on board, made
" me shudder. You may remember" said he, "the
" little old man," (1 did so, and shall never forget
him. At this moment, his spare form and wrinkled
visage, agitated with wonder and indignation while
the girl was giving her evidence, are before me), in
" his tortures he drew the iron stake to which he was
" fastened from the ground, and had nearly got away
** from the fire ; but they drove the stake into the

PREFACE. XXVU

" ground again, and applied more fuel. Both were
" literally roasted to death."

Such was the case which gave me my first right
views of negro slavery in the sugar colonies, almost
as soon as I reached their shores.

My previous impressions on the subject, were not
less erroneous than those which strangely yet prevail
with too many in the middle and upper classes of
this country. An uncle, and an elder brother of
mine, had reconciled themselves to the practical
system ; and the latter, a man of as much native be-
nignity as T have ever known, was then engaged in
it as a planter. My fellow-passengers, all West In-
dians, had kind and pleasing manners ; and they had
all, as usual, in like cases, taken pains with me to
extenuate that revolting incident of the state, which
the uninformed are led to believe is its only hard-
ship, — liability to be whipped, by the mandate of a
private master. They, indeed, somewhat counter-
acted, in this respect, their own purpose ; by insist-
ing much upon, and magnifying, the faults of the
slaves, and their general ignorance and stupidity, as
apologies for a discipline without which it was im-
possible to govern them : for I had reflection enough
to apprehend that such adverse and contemptuous
views of them in the minds of their masters, were
not unlikely to be both the effects, and causes, of
severity in their treatment. On the whole, how-
ever, I was not indisposed to believe, that an insti-
tution, to which so many of my humane countrymen,
and some of my near relations and friends, had recon-

XXVIU PREFACE.

ciled themselves, was as lenient, generally, in prac-
tice, as the case would well allow.

I bless God, that by the singular means here
recorded, I was kept from adding to such ordinary
sources of prejudice, the self-love and self delusion,
by which a man is easily reconciled to bad practices,
when his own immediate interests, or his own credit,
plead for their indulgence and defence ; and more
especially, when habit has insensibly lowered in his
mind, that moral standard by which he forms his
judgment.

The case I have mentioned was every way calcu-
lated to rescue me at the outset, from delusion. As
a lawyer, I could not but be deeply impressed with
the shocking contrast it presented to the impartial
and humane administration of British justice, and
its reversal of every principle that I had been taught
to reverence, by writers on general jurisprudence.
And how much were my indignant feelings aug-
mented, when I learned, from an enquiry which it
suggested, that white men in the same island, were
not only exempt from all such barbarous departures
from the laws of England ; but for the wilful murder
of a slave, were liable only to a fine of fifteen
pounds.*

It gave me incidentally, also, a full proof how
greatly the feelings of slave-masters in general,
were indurated by the system they administered ;

* See the passages in my former volume, before referred to, and tlie whole
of the sixth section of its fifth chapter, as to the servile criminal code.

PREFACE. XXIX

for the case, naturally, was mentioned by me with
reprobation, after my arrival in St. Christopher, to
persons of both sexes, whom I met with there ;
and though the cruel mode of execution, was con-
demned by them, or undefended against my cen-
sures, I could easily perceive, that with few excep-
tions, their feelings on the subject were by no
means responsive to my own. And as to the mode
of trial, and conduct of the court, they were little, if
at all, disposed to concur in my strictures ; but rather
to extenuate or defend such proceedings, which I
soon found were in unison with those in use among
themselves, on the score of the bad characters of
slaves in general, and the difficulty of extorting truth
from them, when under examination, as to their own
crimes, or those of their brethren.

I was indebted, in short, to this early and impres-
sive view of slavery, and the cruel prejudices in-
spired by it, for the resolution that I immediately
formed, and declared, never to become the owner of
a slave ; and if I have contributed in any degree to
the abolition of the slave trade, or shall ever have
the happiness to promote the deliverance of its much
injured victims in our colonies, the blood that was
cruelly shed at Bridgetown, forty-seven years ago,
was not shed in vain.

I trust that the statement of this case on my own
unsupported authority, will not be thought a de-
parture from the rule which I stand pledged to ad-
here to in the body of this work. I shall found no
argument or general observation upon it ; nor is it
referable to any part of the system that I have here to

XXX PREFACE.

delineate. Neither can it be my aim to insinuate,
that like cruel executions are still in use ; for I freely
avow my belief of the contrary, and that in most, if
not all the colonies, where they had been deemed
legal, they are now prohibited by positive law.

iVs to the general spirit of public injustice and
inhumanity towards slaves, which the case exempli-
fies, this, had a retrospective view of it been my
object, might have been shewn to have prevailed in
the same island, at a much more recent period
I might have cited, for instance, those shocking cases
in the official correspondence of Lord Seaford, which
were printed by parliament ; and the long-continued
resistance of the colony of Barbadoes, when soli-
cited by His Majesty's government to protect their
slaves from wilful murder, by annexing to the crime
its proper punishment, instead of a fine of fifteen
pounds ; though several atrocious cases of slave
murder had then recently shown the barbarous
effects of such impunity.

I see no objection, therefore, to my prefixing to
my work this personal narrative, though supported
by my own testimony alone, as tending to reconcile
without a boast, my own early and lasting antipathy
to negro slavery, with that long exposure to its
local influences, by which many better men have
been reconciled to it, at the expence of their native
feelings.

After all, the plan of my present work is such, I
repeat, as to make the credit of its author, or the
sources of his anti-slavery feelings, of little or no
importance. 1 need, and 1 desire, no confidence in

PREFACE. XXXI

the writer ; but only in the admissions of those by
whom his general views and practical objects are
opposed.

There is one probable objection to my labours,
against which it may be important to guard. In
pleading the case of the unfortunate slaves, I may
be supposed agere actum ; needlessly to advocate a
reformation already resolved upon, and in progress ;
and on the completion of which His Majesty's pre-
sent government is sufficiently intent. But it has
been a leading object of my work to prove, that no
measures hitherto taken, or known to be in contem-
plation, either for terminating slavery, or mitigating
its enormous evils, have any real tendency to pro-
mote those very important and necessary ends.

So clear and demonstrable is this truth, that were
it in my power to cancel all that has been done for
carrying into effect the resolutions of May 1823, 1
should not hesitate to do so ; at least if I could re-
store to the public mind that simplicity of concep-
tion and feeling on the subject, which then prevailed i

The duty of delivering the country from the guilt
and shame of slavery, has been solemnly recognized
by the government and legislature ; but the means
resolved upon were utterly inadequate in their plan ;
and in their feeble and vacillating application, have
proved worse than useless. They have embarrassed
and retarded, rather than advanced, the work of real
reformation. They have contirmed and strengthened
the resistance of its enemies ; and weakened and di-
vided its friends. For one dispute on the general
principle, a hundred have been substituted on the

XXXll PREFACE.

practical details ; and while objects too minute to be
worth contending- for, or of no real value at all, have
given birth to complex and voluminous discussions,
distracting the attention, both of the government and
the public; the worst, the most destructive, and
most general, of the oppressions under which the
poor slaves are daily groaning and perishing, are left
unremedied, unattended to, and almost forgot.

It is to demonstrate the reality, and the enormity
of these general and standing oppressions, that I
now address myself to the public. It is to prove
what I have always maintained, that a merciless
excess of forced labour, exacted by means as merci-
less, and its ordinary concomitants, badness and
scantiness of food, are the main evils, the former
especially, by which the field negroes on sugar
plantations are afflicted, worn down, and destroyed ;
that these economical oppressions, give birth and
tenacity to all the rest ; and that till these are cor-'
rected, all other means for improving the condition
of the slaves physically, intellectually, or morally,
or for preserving their declining race even from de-
struction, will be found perfectly vain and useless.

These propositions certainly are not new ; and as
to the existence of such oppressions, they have been
so often admitted, that a man who has read much
of the public evidence and controversial pieces,
though only the colonial side, cannot possibly enter-
tain a doubt of their frequent occurrence. The
question with him can only be as to their degree,
and their general prevalence.

But with a large part of the British public, it will

PRETACE, XXXUi

be matter of painful novelty to find to what a truly
enormous extent, these avaricious excesses have been
carried, and still prevail ; not in particular cases
merely, but in general and ordinary practice ; and
with what strict demonstration these can be proved to
be the sources of almost every other species of op-
pression that humanity has to lament, in the treat-
ment of plantation slaves.

But how to remedy these baneful evils, while
slavery exists, is a difficult problem indeed ; and I
can suggest no practical solution of it, that would
not be attended with difficulties as great, and op-
posed by the planters as pertinaciously, as the disso-
lution of the state itself. If any such remedy can
be discovered by others, my labours may assist their
researches ; as the first step towards the cure of what
is morbid in the natural or civil body, is the ascer-
tainment of the nature and extent of the disease.

But the result, in my mind, of long experience
and anxious reflection, aided by a familiar acquaint-
ance with the calamitous case, during great part of
a long life, is, that the stern relation of master and
slave admits of no effectual modification by law ;
that to limit its extent or duration, is the only real
p'elliative of its enormous mischiefs, and its abolition
their only cure.

* My manuscript has been sent to press in different portions and at dif-
ferent times, as I progressively was able to prepare it, during nearly a year
past; which it may be necessary to observe, in order to avoid the appcara^ioe
of anachronisms, in tj-.e notice of different publications, a? having just ap-
peared, or met my eye^ at certain jXii>iti uf my piorness.

CONTENTS.

BOOK II.

DELINEATION OF THE STATE OF SLAVERY IN OUR COLONIES,
IN ITS ORDINARY PRACTICAL NATURE AND EFFECTS.

CHAPTER I.

Page

Reasons for resuming this Work; Defence of
THE First, and Plan of the Second Volume .. 1

[The object of the work is to prove the excessive labour
exacted from the slaves, and the extreme parsimony of the
master in their maintenance and comfort, — Sources of de-
lusion on these points. — The author relies in this, as in his
former volume, exclusively on adverse testimony; — asserts
his right to employ an adversary's admissions in disproof of
his statements ; — and defends his former volume from the
misrepresentations of his opponents, and particularly of Mr.
Alexander Barclay. — Appreciation of the early testimonies of
high naval and military officers, and West Indian Governors, in
favour of slavery ; their total want of truth being now admitted,
either directly or virtually, by the modern advocates of slavery,
Mr. Macdonnell, Mr. Barclay, and others ; and established by
the testimony of Dr. Collins. — Contradictory representations
and illusory proceedings of West Indians at home and abroad.
— Explanation of the plan of this volume, which is confined
to an exhibition of the actual state of the predial slaves on
sugar plantations, and of the oppressions as to labour, food,
and general treatment, to which they are subject.]

b 2

XXXVl CONTENTS.

CHAPTER II.

Page

Of Agricultural Labour in the Torrid Zone,

AND THE PERNICIOUS EfFECTS OF ITS ExCESS
WHEN FORCIBLY EXACTED 45

[Exhausting effects of hard labour, in tropical climates, on
negroes as well as Europeans. — Compensatory provisions of
the Great Author of nature. — Testimony of Major Moody
accompanied by remarks on his " Philosophy of Labour." —
Deplorable effects of coerced labour on the indigenous
inhabitants of St. Domingo. — Testimony of Dr. Collins to
the pernicious effects of excessive labour.]

CHAPTER III.

The high Probability that the Amount of
FORCED Labour on Sugar Plantations is op-
pressively AND destructively EXCESSIVE, DE-
duced from the natural tendency of the
System ; and confirmed by the Decline of
Population AMONG the PREDIAL Slaves 57

Sect. I . — Natural Tendencies of the System ib.

[Comparison of the influence of freedom and of slavery in
fixing a proper criterion of labour. — Strong tendency to an
undue exaction of labour on sugar plantations. — The argu-
ment for the lenient tendency of the system, drawn from
motives of self-interest in the master, considered and refuted.
— Alleged dislike of the Colonists to the continuance of the
slave trade shewn to be unfounded.]

Sect. 2. — Decline of Population among the Slaves on Sugar
Estates 76

[This calamity peculiar to sugar cultivation. — Increase of
slaves in the United States, and of free negroes in Hayti. —
Proofs to the same effect, furnished by the Council of Trinidad.]

CONTENTS. XXXVli

CHAPTER IV.

Page

The actual ordinary Details and general
Amount, in Point of Time, of forced Labour
ON Sugar Plantations particularly stated
and proved ; and the cruel Excess demon-
strated 82

Sect. 1. — Introductory Remarks; and Divisions of the
Subject of this Chapter , ib.

[The intensity of labour cannot be accurately measured ;
but its duration, in point of time, maybe measured. — Com-
parison proposed of the ordinary duration of agricultural
labour in England and in the West Indies.]

Sect. 2. — The Labour is cruelly excessive in point of
Time 84

[Mr. Ramsay's statements on this subject. — Opposino-
statements of Colonial advocates and witnesses, with their

discrepancies and contradictions. — Jamaica Act of 1788.

Testimonies of Messrs. Beckford, Tobin, Willock, B. Edwards,
Dela Beche,&c. — The delusions of Colonial advocates on this
subject detected; — evidence of Dr. Collins, Mr. Thomas,
Mr. Dwarris, and Marly. — Misrepresentations of Mr. Mac-
queen exposed. — Extent of twilight in the West Indies.

The evidence of Mr. Stewart and others of Jamaica, and of
Mr. Dwarris, as well as of Colonial Acts, in proof that field-
labour occupies eleven hours and a half of each day.

Additional exactions of slave labour, arising from the distance
of the field from the homestall ; from the quality and unpre-
pared state of the food allowed them ; from the toil of col-
lecting grass for the cattle after the hours of field labour ;
and from the night-work of crop. — All these oppressive aggra-
vations of the labours of the field proved by a variety of
testimonies, including Mr. Dwarris, Mr. De la Beche, Dr.
Collins, the slave protector of Berbice, and Mr. Mitchell of
Trinidad. — Duration of the season of crop. — Estimate of the
average duration of the slave's daily labour throughout the
year. — Comparison of West India slavery with that of the
Israelites in Egypt. — Strictures on the theory of Major
Moody.]

XXXVm CONTENTS.

CHAPTER V.

Page

The Labour shewn to be excessive also, for

THE most part, IN POINT OF INTENSITY, OR THE
DEGREE OF ACTUAL ExERTION 161

[Probabilities of the case. — Intense labour of holing or
digging cane-holes. — Celerity of movement required in the
work of distributing manure &c. — Privation of rest, and in-
tensity and continuity of labour during crop. — These oppres-
sions proved by a variety of testimony, and particularly that
of Mr. Campbell and Mr. Bailey of Grenada, Mr. Tobin of
Nevis, Mr. Willock, Sir Ashton Byam, and Dr. Athill of
Antigua, Mr. Beckford of Jamaica, and Barre de St. Venant
of St. Domingo.]

CHAPTER VI.

Comparison of the Amount of Slave Labour
ON Sugar Plantations with that of Agri-
cultural Labourers in England 184

[Assertions of West Indian witnesses and advocates (Mr.
Baillie, Lord Lavington, Mr. Macqueen &c.), respecting the
comparative lightness of slave labour, disproved by a view of
the general duration of daily labour in England.]

CHAPTER VII.

The Means by which Labour is enforced on
Sugar Plantations greatly aggravates its
Severity, and are in their Nature and ef-
fects extremely cruel and pernicious .... 192

Sect. 1 . Preliminary Remarks 192

[The driving system no longer denied as heretofore, but
avowed and defended.]

Sect. 2. Driving described 193

[The nature of this practice exemplified in the process of
digging cane-holes.]

CONTENTS. XXxix

Page
Sect. 3. Denials and Misrepresentations of the practice

stated and refuted 195

[Practice denied by Colonial proprietors in Parliament; by
Mr. Dallas ; by Mr. Macqueen; by the Council and Assembly
of St. Vincents, and by Mr. Dwarris; — and their misrepresen-
tations on the subject completely refuted by Dr. Collins, him-
self a Planter of St. Vincent ; by the Council of Barbadoes ;
by Mr. De la Beche, and Mr. Stewart of Jamaica; and by
Mr. M'Donnell, the Secretary of the associated planters of
Demerara, who affirms driving to be the peculiar charac-
teristic, and unavoidable attendant of Slavery.]

Sect. 4. The cruel and pernicious nature of the practice

stated and proved 214

[Driving is the characteristic and most opprobrious feature
of the system. — The dreadful effects of this brutal coercion
shewn by Mr. Stewart, Dr. Collins and Mr. De la Beche. —
The apologies advanced for driving examined. Complaints,
and redress of the sufferers by this practice, impossible. Ge-
neral character of those who administer it — Overseers, mana-
gers and attorneys of plantations.]

Sect. 5. The only remedy for those mischiefs compatible

with forced labour is individual task-work 231

[Unjust and cruel effects of the driving method of coercion
proved by Mr. Stewart, Mr. de la Beche, Mr. Roughley, a
Jamaica planter, and Dr. Collins ; and, by the latter especially,
its cruel effects on the sick and weakly. — Exposure of Colo-
nial impostures on this subject. — The blame of its destructive
severity attaches not to the drivers, or even chiefly to the
overseers and managers, but to the unnatural system itself.]

CHAPTER VIII.

The Maintenance of the Plantation Slaves is

IN A VERY oppressive AND CRUEL DeGREE PAR-
SIMONIOUS AND INSUFFICIENT 243

Sect. 1. The proposition shewn to be highly probable from

the nature of the case ib.

xl CONTENTS.

Pago.

[Probabilities of this parsimony arising from avarice armed
with power ; and from the temptations produced by pecuniary
distress and by competition. — Those who are guilty of an
undue CAaction of labour, are not likely to be liberal either of
food, or of time for raising it. — Feelings of humanity form no
quate counterbalance to such temptations.

260

Sect. 3. — Different modes of feeding the slaves in different
Colo/lies

[In Jamaica and many other Islands, the slaves are sub-
sisted by the produce of their own provirion grounds, culti-
tivated on Sunday, and a few days besides. — In the Leward
Islands, they are chiefly fed by imported provisions ; and in
Barbadoes, Demerara, and Berbice, chiefly by allowances of
provisions, raised, on the ordinary days of labour, by the
compulsory labour of the whole gang.]

Sect. IV. — Of the mode and measure of subsistence in the

home-fed colonies 264

[Difficulty of ascertaining the measure of food, when the
slaves grow their own provisions. — In this case the deficiency
of the supply can only be proved by circumstantial evidence.

— The testimony of Dr. Collins on this subject. — Sunday
employed by the slaves in labouring in their provision grounds.

— Distance of those grounds from the home-stall. — Slaves
less scantily fed in home-fed than in foreign-fed, colonies. —
The time required for raising food.]

Sect. V. — Of the subsistence in foreign-fed colonies in

respect of its ordinary nature and amoniit 277

[Statements of Mr. Ramsay, and Mr.Tobin ; of Dr. Collins ;
and of various other witnesses ; as to the quantity of the food
allowed. — The careful suppression by West Indian advocates
of the documentary evideiice in their possession on this point.
— The regulations of the law of the Leeward Islands prove
the extreme scantiness of the subsistence allowed to the
slaves. — The allowances prescribed by that law compared
with those of the Bahamas, and of the prisons in Jamaica. —
The alleged further advantages possessed by the slaves, of
marketing, &c. considered. — The extreme unfairness of West
Indian advocates in their representations on these points.]

CONTENTS. xli

Page.

Sect. VI. — The subsistence of the slaves shewn from com-
parative views to be extremely scanty and inade-
quate 305

[A comparison of the allowances of agricultural slaves in
the foreign-fed colonies, with the consumption of agricultural
labourers in England, and with English prison allowances ;
with the allowances also to the slaves in the Bahamas, and in
the prisons and workhouses of Jamaica, and with those made
to slaves in the United States, Brazil, arid the colonies of
Spain and France. — Testimony of Dr. Collins as to the
insufficiency of food. — The state of the West Indian slaves
in this respect, compared with that of the Israelites in Egypt ;
of the villeins in England ; and of the slaves in ancient
Greece and Rome. — Exposure of the grossly fallacious state-
ments of colonial witnesses, as to the extent of the property,
and the accumulations, and hidden riches of slaves. —
The question considered with a view to the means of the
slaves to redeem themselves. — Reasons why their right of
self redemption is so strenuously resisted by the colonists. —
Comparative facilities of manumission that were enjoyed by
Greek and Roman slaves, and by English villeins,]

CHAPTER IX.

The Allowances of Clothing to the Field
Negroes by their Owners is also in a
shameful Degree penurious and insuffici-
ent 342

[The false representations on this subject given by Mr.
Barclay and other individuals, and by public bodies, com-
pared with the lav/ and the practice. — Counter-statements of
Dr. Collins. — Tlie colonists challenged to produce the au-
thentic documents in their possession of the clothing allowed
their slaves. — Their total destitution of shoes, and the many
injurious effects caused by the want of them. —Consumption
of shoes by the Haytian population.]

xlii CONTENTS.

CHAPTER X.

Page

The Slaves are very badly lodged 359

[Testimony of Dr. Collins on this point. — Misapprehen-
sions to which strangers and casual visitants are exposed
respecting it; and which are increased by the deceptive
statements of colonists.]

CHAPTER XI.

The Slaves are also treated with great Harsh-
ness, Neglect, and Inhumanity when sick .. 362

[Strong and decisive testimony of Dr. Collins on this sub-
ject.— The plantation sick-house, most improperly termed a
hospital, described. — It is not only an apartment for the sick
but for the confinement of delinquents awaiting punishment,
or already lacerated by its infliction. — A further reference to
the testimony of Dr. Collins and also of Mr. Beckford.]

CHAPTER XII.

The whole Expense of the Maintenance of
Plantation Slaves estimated and compared
with the cost of Free Labour 374

[The respective statements on this subject of Mr. Ramsay
and his opponent Mr. Tobin. — The remarkable reluctance al-
ways shewn by Colonial advocates and Colonial authorities to
afford information on this point ; and the consequent want
of data for a correct estimate. — A document produced which
shews that the expense of supplies from Europe did not ex-
ceed \2s. a slave. — Immense disproportion of the expense
caused by the maintenance of the slave, and by that of the
free labourer in England. — Effects of the prevailing pecuniary
distress of the planters, and also of their prosperity, on the
happiness and comfort of the slaves.]

CONTENTS. xliii

CHAPTER Xlir.

Page

Concluding and practical Reflections 387

[The preceding pages prove slavery to be a disgrace to
Great Britain. — Its monstrous injustice and inhumanity insisted
upon — Such a system ought not to be permitted to exist. —
The time and manner of its abolition, and the claim of
compensation considered ; — Mr. Pitt's view of compensation.
— Large profits of the planter hurtful to the slave. — A
warning voice to the legislature, and the nation ; calling them
to consider the disturbed state of Europe, and -the various
events that have evinced the divine displeasure with the succes-
sive Governments of France, Spain, Portugal, and Holland,
for their obstinate adherence to the slave trade and slavery.
— The peculiar case of Great Britain considered in this view.
— The conduct to be pursued in the approaching session of
parliament. — The utter hopelessness of reform by colonial
means, shewn in the abortive results of the resolutions of Mr.
Ellis, in 1797, and of Mr. Canning, in May' 1823.— It is our
duty no longer to look to modifications of slavery, but to its
extinction. — The various modifications proposed are all more
or less objectionable. — The prayer of the people of this
country ought to be simply for the abolition of slavery,
leaving the detail of means to government and parliament. —
Reprehensible policy of the Government in respect to this
question. The fatal effects of the failure of the Registry
Bill of 1826, and of the wholly ineflftcient substitutes for it
since adopted by the colonists and accepted by the crown. —
The author's vindication of himself from the charges of incon-
sistency brought against him by Lord Seaford, and other
colonial advocates. — The resolutions of May 1823, contuma-
ciously resisted by the colonists. — Outrageous conduct of the
Jamaica legislature; their persecuting spirit and enactments ;
and their unwarrantable resistance not only to the recom-
mendations of the imperial legislature, but to inquiry by the
executive authority of the crown into the due administration of
justice. — The case of the Rev. G. W. Bridges.- — No beneficial
change to be hoped for, except from the direct intervention of
parliament. — The power of West Indian influence in parlia-
ment, and with the government. — The abolition of slavery
can alone cureitsevils. — The hopes entertained even of any ma-
terial effect from a concession of the right of self-redemption
was vain and illusory ; and now that the West Indian commit-
tee at home make common cause against it, with their brethren
abroad, the case is still more hopeless. — The danger of longer
delaying to decide this question — not merely dangers of excite-
menamongthe slaves from frustrated hopes, butofincreaseddis-

xliv CONTENTS.

Piige

affection at home, even among the most moral and chris-
tian part of the community ; provided padiament and
government shall continue to reject the universal prayer of
the nation to let the oppressed go free.]

APPENDIX.

Cases of Cruelty, indicating the general
Prevalence, in the Sugar Colonies, of In-
sensibility TO THE Sufferings of Slaves,
AND an Indisposition to restrain or punish
THE Authors of such Offences.. 415

No 1. — The cruelties related by Mr. G. H. Smith, with the
proceedings against liim of the magistrates of Westmore-
land, and the Assembly of Jamaica 416

No. 2. — Presentment of a grand Jury in St. Christopher, ex-
tracted from a paper printed by order of the House of
Commons of May 1, 1827 ' 43G

No. 3. — Conviction in the Bahama Islands, for cruelty to a
female slave called Kate, extracted from papers jjrinted
by order of the House of Commons of March 27, 1829 . .

No. 4. — Account of the treatment of the slaves on two uni-
ted estates, called Fahies, and Ortons, in the Island of
St. Christopher, and the fatal effects that folloiced . . . . 442

THE STATE CALLED

SLAVERY,

BRITISH WEST INDIES,

DELINEATED AND CONSIDERED.

BOOK II.

DELINEATION OF THE STATE IN ITS ORDINARY
PRACTICAL NATURE AND EFFECTS.

CHAPTER I.

REASONS FOR RESUMING THIS WORK; DEFRNCF. OF THE
FIRST, AND PLAN OF THE SECOND VOLUME.

Th e two grand divisions of" this work proposed at the outset,
were, first, a delineation of slavery in a theoretic view, as a
legal institution ; and secondly, a delineation of the state in
respect of its practical nature and effects. Thor former part
of my task has been performed ; the latter has been long re-
tarded, and still remains to be accomplished.

While many readers of my former volume have expressed
some impatience of desire for the appearance of the present ;
others, perhaps, have thought that this part of my plan might
be conveniently and properly laid aside ; considering how much
the practice of slavery has, during the last five years, been
discussed before the public by other writers, whose principles
are in accordance with my own. — To a large part of the com-
munity, it may seem that the great objects of my labours, the
mitigation and gradual abolition of slavery, are virtually at-

VOL. II. u

2 Reasons for

tained or secured ; and that the Parliamentary resolutions of
May, 1823, with the consequent measures of Government,
have made this sequel of my vv^ork useless, at least, if not
even adverse to my purpose.

That such views have been entertained by many, even
among the sincere friends of the anti-slavery cause, I well
know and lament ; and have reason to fear that they may
still widely prevail ; for, though those measures have been
nearly fruitless in all the colonies, and in some of them the
solicitations of the Crown, and the voice of Parliament have
been treated with the utmost contempt and defiance by the
Assemblies ; their agents and partizans in this country have
played a far more politic game, labouring indefatigably to
persuade the British Public that opposition in language has
been accompanied, in some measure at least, with practical
compliance ; that the Planters and Assemblies, like the son
in the parable, while answering to the parental command
" I go not," have actually gone into the field : that much has
been already done, and that patience on our part, alone is
wanting to make their obedience entire.

In my last publication, " Enghnid enslaved hy her own Slave
Colonies," I endeavored to shew the erroneousness and the
fatal tendency of such opinions ; but not, I fear, with suffi-
cient general effect on the public mind ; and if any of the
real friends of reformation still indulge a false security, and
condemn as needless, further attempts to excite, on the right
side, the feeling of the British people, one effort only remains
by which I can hope to disabuse them ; the laborious and
painful one, which again employs my pen. If any thing can
effectually serve to dispel the delusions that prevail, and
satisfy reasoning minds that slavery has not been, nor with-
out parliamentary legislation ever will be, reformed, it is such
means as I have long since engaged to supply ; a development
and demonstration of the true practical nature and fixed prin-
ciples of the system, not in its particular, but general ad-
ministration, deduced exclusively from the evidence of those
by whom it is defended and maintained.

In proposing remedies for the inveterate, deeply seated,
and deadly disease of colonial slavery, I have to encounter
difficulties like those of a faithful well-informed physician,

resuming this Work. 3

whose patient has been long in the hands of deluded friends,
and self-interested crafty practitioners ; both adverse, though
on different views, to the only possible means of cure. The
former, from groundless apprehensions of danger in the right
and only effectual course, are trusting to wretched palliatives,
which are of no real use even in the way of mitigation,
while the latter are applying them, and alleging good ef-
fects from their inchoate use, merely to support their own
credit, and keep the patient longer in their own mercenary
hands. The physician is aware, that to dispel the delusion
will be not only a difficult, but a thankless and invidious
office ; but sees there is no other expedient to prevent a fatal
termination. To obtain the use of truly efficacious means,
he must convince the too confident friends of the vanity of
their present hopes, and the fallacy of the pretended improve-
ments, by exposing to them, however alarmingly, the in-
veterate constitutional causes, the still subsisting malignity,
and extreme danger of the case.

But though the present state of the Anti-slavery cause,
unhappily, is not such as to absolve me from my promised
task, much has been done by enlightened coadjutors that
may well justify a great contraction of my plan. I refer
particularly to the work called " Negro Slavery," to the
writings of The Reverend Mr. Bickill, and Mr.
Cooper, and above all, to those very valuable tracts, Tri e
Anti-slavery Monthly Reports. They contain, col-
lectively, such copious information as to the practice of
Slavery in the Sugar Colonies, that had the writers adopted
my own plan of delineating Slavery systematically, and in
its ordinary character, and relying only on the evidence of
our opponents, they would have left me little, if any thing,
to add ; but though those well-informed writers have not
thought it necessary to use such abstinence in respect of
evidence (which certainly they were no wise bound to do),
enough has been proved by them from irrefragable authority,
and even out of the mouths of the planters themselves, to
establish many of the abuses that I meant to develop ; and
to refute decisively most of the idle pretences of improve-
ments wiiich I should otherwise have had to repel.

B 2

4 Reasons fur

I shall be content to leave in their hands all that relates
to the shocking general neglect of intellectual, moral, and
religious instruction ; to the profanation of the Sabbath ; to
the discouragement of marriage; to the licentious and inde-
cent treatment of females ; and to excesses and barbarities in
punishment ; with the non-execution and perversion of those
laws which profess to restrain such abuses. I shall abstain
also from adding to their strictures, or to my own in my
former works, on the hardships under which the slaves labour,
in point of law and practice, from their liability to be sold
apart from their families, the rejection of their evidence, the
impediments to their acquisition of freedom, and its insecurity
when obtained.

What then, it may possibly be asked, after such a cata-
logue of exclusions, are to be the subjects of my delineation
and proof? " Surely it may be thought, most of, if not
all, the evils of slavery must be comprised in this enumera-
tion."

Would to heaven that the fact were so ! — The state,
though bad enough, would be merciful and mild, compared
with what it really is. It would be a case sufficiently la-
mentable and opprobrious ; but not such as has harrowed up
my soul with unavailing sympathy from youth to age; and
now urges me to renew my labours, after more than three
score and eleven years have chilled my human hopes, be-
numbed my faculties, and left me no selfish good beneath the
sun, so precious as repose and peace.

Numerous and cruel though the oppressions are by which
the poor negroes are degraded, tormented, and destroyed,
there are two which 1 have always regarded and publicly
denounced as by far the worst ; not only because the most
general, and the most afflictive, but because they give birth
and virulence and tenacity, to almost all the rest. I mean
the trull/ enormous amount of labour to which the Jie Id negroes,
or ordinary plantation slaves, are coerced; and the almost in-
credible degree of parsimony iifith lohich they are maintained.
Most of the other sufferings incident to their hapless state
are casual and temporary ; but these are certain and pe-
rennial ; and though mitio;ated in a small degree under the

resuinbig this Work. 5

more liberal of their owners, are, to a great and grievous ex-
tent, their universal lot.

Such oppressions are also the least likely to meet with
any private restraint or correction. Abuses, the effects of
anger, revenge, or other malignant passions, in a manager,
overseer, or other subordinate master, might be expected to
be much restrained or punished by the owner's authority, if
brought to his knowledge ; for in such cases the interests of
proprietors and of slaves are clearly on the same side. But
oppressions of a gainful or economical kind, are perpetrated
for the owner's emolument; and the present sacrifices ne-
cessary to their correction are what few sugar planters are
able if willing to make. Such oppressions also, when
established by general usage, become, from the efi'ects of
connnercial competition, hardly capable of correction, without
ruinous consequences to individuals, except by the regulations
of a general and compulsory law.

The pre-eminence of evil in these economical branches of
oppression will more fully appear, when it shall be shewn
what cruel eftects they produce, and how large a portion of
the other ordinary severities of the system are their natural,
and, in great measure, inseparable attendants. Though the
ordinary discipline of the plantations is odious and inhuman
in its nature, the inflictions of the inndictive, when compared
with those of the coercive whip, are small in their general
amount ; and the former, too, are, for the most part, the pe-
nalties of defaults to which excess of labour and insufficiency
of aliment give rise. Of every hundred stripes, that are
given on a sugar plantation, exclusive of the drivers' coercive
process, ninety or more are inflicted for absence from the
field at the appointed time, or the short performance of a
solitary task ; and that these delinquencies are much more
often the effects of fatigue and inanition than any other cause,
I shall abundantly prove, out of the mouths of the planters
themselves.

How, indeed, can these consequences be doubted? If,
under a system of forced labour, the work imposed is ex-
cessive, and the quantum of food inadequate, it is manifest
that in proportion to the degree of those economical oppres-

6 Reasons for

sions, must be the seventy of the discipline by which they
are imposed. The resistance of nature can be no otherwise
overcome. If you would drive your tired post horses another
stage, you must not restrain your driver from the free use of
his whip; still less if they have been also stinted in their food.

That labour, so excessive and continuous as to leave the
common field negro neither spirits nor time for any voluntary
efforts, must preclude his intellectual and religious improve-
ment, his acquisition of property, and whatever else we com-
prise in the idea of civilization, is equally clear. In short,
this species of oppression, when its cruel extent is proved, will
be plainly seen to be incompatible with all real improvements
in the physical condition of the slaves ; and still more with
such advances in the intellectual and moral scale, as are held
(whether rightly or not, I will not in this place enquire) to be
necessary preparatives for the termination of their bondage.

For these reasons, then, while I rely upon the writings of
my fellow-labourers, as having exonerated me from a large
part of the task that I undertook, I feel the engagement still
binding, and the duty imperative, to delineate the general
practice of the sugar colonies, in regard to those most import-
ant articles of oppression, the extreme degree of forced labour
imposed upon plantation slaves, and the great inadequacy of
maintenance given in return.

Let me not be understood to mean, that my humane and
respected coadjutors have wholly neglected those most inter-
esting topics. Enough has been said by them to shew that
their views in these respects are in general like my own;
though the excess of labour has not, in my judgment, had that
prominence among the abuses they have exposed, which its
extreme cruelty and pernicious effects deserve ; nor been
stated with sufficient circumstantiality and precision. But
the grand and general desideratum they have left me to sup-
ply, is a demonstration of the facts of the case from irresist-
ble evidence; for such I may surely call testimony on the
anti-slavery side, when cited from colonial tongues and colo-
nial pens alone. And this, in respect of the ordinary amount
of forced labour, is of peculiar importance ; because no part
of the general system has been a subject of so much assiduous

resuming this Work. 7

misrepresentation by our opponents ; nor is there any other, I
believe, in respect of which such wide misconception prevails.
The quantum of daily work directly and indirectly exacted
from the field negroes has been reduced by bold assertions and
artful fallacies to less than one half of its actual ordinary
amount; and this, by writers and witnesses whose statements
have been strongly accredited to the public by their means of
information, their characters, and stations in life. A hundred
colonial tongues and pens have not only boldly denied the
existence of this most general and notorious species of oppres-
sion, but actually claimed credit to the Planters for wonderful
moderation and liberality in the use of their coercing power ;
assuring us that the labour of the slaves is very light; nay,
lighter by far than that of the free English peasant. This lat-
ter proposition, indeed, has long been the chorus of their
common song; ; and incredible thouoh the fiction will be found
in its nature, when examined by a reasoning mind, yet such
is the effect of bold reiterated public assertion, that many, I
doubt not, believe it ; or regard it at least as having some
approximation to the truth.

How, indeed, can I doubt this, or deem a demonstration of
the true case superfluous, when I find the delusion still cur-
rent even among some eminent political economists and states-
men ; so as actually to form an element in their calculations,
in plans for the mitigation and gradual extinction of slavery,
and for the supplanting it by free labour in the cultivation of
sugar estates? If they had not been grossly deceived as to
the actual amount of slave labour, they could not regard it as
a standard up to which, or in any sustainable competition
with which, free men will or ought to work ; still less could
they expect the improvement of the common field negro's*

* The distinction between the great mass of plantation slaves, those
who wield the hoe and are driven, whom I call " Field Negroes," or
'* Common Field Negroes," and the drivers and artificers, called " Head
Negroes" is one which I must request my readers always to bear in mind.
The apologists of the system always artfully confound them together; and
it is one of their great engines of deception. The latter, from the nature
of their occupations, cannot be driven, or worked to any destructive excess.
The same is more obviously the case with domestics.

8 Reasons for

condition, or the attainment of his freedom, by the fruits of
supererogatory toil.

Another reason for the exclusive preference I mean to give
to the topics of labour and maintenance is, that the generality
of the economical oppressions they involve makes them unde-
niably fair characteristics, not to say essential properties, of
the system at large ; and will enable me more clearly in the
sequel to prove the hopelessness of its reformation by West
Indian legislators; or, in other words, by the planters them-
selves.

When cases of excessive cruelties, or other particular abuses
are adduced as arguments for reformation, the standing
answer is, " that the instances of such crimes which we have
" been able to establish incontrovertibly before the British
" public are not numerous ; and that it is harsh to characterize
" the general practice by a few rare instances of individual
" crimes, such as are to be found in every country, and under
" the best institutions."

The defence is plainly fallacious ; for it infers the rarity of
the crime, from that of its public dete'ction and proof; whereas
one of our most undeniable charges against the general system
is, that the public detection and proof of such cruel abuses
as slavery has manifestly a strong tendency to produce, are
for the most part precluded both by manners and by laws.
The Lettres de Cachet of the old French despotism, the infer-
nal practices of the Inquisition, and every other form of
tyranny on earth that has shrouded its abuses in darkness, by
the terror of its power, and by withholding the means of an
effectual appeal to the laws, might be defended precisely in the
same way.

Besides, these apologists always take care to sink that most
instructive and impressive circumstance in such adduced
cases, the way in which the crime, when brought to light, is
treated by the magistrates and juries, and by the popular
feelings of the colony. A single conviction for a crime natu-
rally odious might serve to indicate its great prevalence in
any society, if the criminal, when convicted, not only escaped
from any judicial punishment at all proportionate to his
offence, and to the dangerous example of its impunity; but lost
little or nothing of his former credit or popularity, and was

resuming thh Work. 9

received in the best company as favourably as before. How
much more, if the popular odium due to the offender, was
transferred to those who prosecuted, and brought him to con-
viction. *

Nevertheless, so difficult is it for the people of this happy
country to conceive what the effects of private slavery are on
the feelings of the masters, and on the popular sentiments of
a community, all the free members of which are habituated to
that harsh relation; and so strongly does our native humanity
predispose us to believe that our fellow subjects in the colonies
cannot ordinarily exercise with severity the despotic powers
which they possess over' their helpless dependents, that the
clearest refutation of these apologies does not wholly remove
their effect. The oppression is believed to be rare, merely
because it cannot be proved to be common.

Much are such honest prepossessions strengthened, in many
minds, by friendship or intimacy with West Indians resident
among us : most of whom are or have been proprietors of
estates in the sugar colonies, and all of them masters of slaves.
I mean, not only through the partial and untrue accounts
which such gentlemen naturally give of a system, in the cha-
racter of which their own credit is involved, and which they
too commonly know only from the report of men under the
same bias ; but because nothing perhaps has been seen in their
manners when amongst us, to indicate feelings less liberal and
humane than our own. It is therefore concluded that a sys-
tem which such men are engaged in, have perhaps personally
administered, and are desirous to uphold, cannot be, in its
ordinary chaacter, extremely cruel and oppressive.

Such reasoners do not consider that the stern relation of
slave master, one in which the conduct of their West Indian
friend has never met their notice, avowedly involves and de-

* Those who are at all conversant with the works of anti-slavery writers
need not be told that several most impressive examples of such a popular
spirit in the sugar colonies have been established beyond denial. I have
given one of them in Appendix, No. I. to my first voluine ; and in an Ap-
pendix to the present division of my work I mean to add some very recent
and striking ones from decisive authorities.

10 Reasons for resuming this Work.

mands a discipline highly repugnant to their own benevolent
feelings. They do not remember either that the same person,
pei'haps, or gentlemen whose apparent suavity and benignity of
manners when in England were not inferior to his, reconciled
themselves to all the now admitted atrocities of the inhuman
slave trade, though it had long existed under their eyes ; and
had opposed pertinaciously its abolition for nearly twenty
years. They do not well estimate the powerful influence of
early prejudice, habit, and example, in warping the human
feelings out of their ordinary current towards a particular ob-
ject ; and, what is the main source of these errors, they do not
know (for West Indians here are always careful to conceal it)
that in their friend's heart, there is a wide partition between
the sympathies and duties that belong to a white fellow-being
and to a black one. If such considerations were not put out
of the account, thinking men would no more rely on the humane
treatment of negro slaves in the West Indies, from what they
see of their masters in England, than on that of the convicts
in the House of Correction, or the patients in a mad-house, on
the score of their keeper's general manners towards those who
are not in his custody, or whose interference and control he
apprehends.

Still, however, this source of error, assiduously cherished
as it is by the colonial party, greatly prejudices the cause of
the unfortunate slaves ; among the many grievous peculiarities
of whose lot it is, that their cruel state is unseen in the coun-
try whose power maintains it, and that they are personally
strangers, while their oppressors are companions and familiar
friends, to the lawgivers, and the generous people, from whose
sympathy alone they can ever obtain relief.

To shew that, in the excessive exaction of labour at least,
the practice of slavery on sugar plantations is universally op-
pressive and cruel, will, I am aware, be to attack the adverse
prejudices I have mentioned in their strongest intrenchments ;
but should I succeed in such an attempt with the public at
large, as with patient and attentive readers I am sure of doing,
there will be an end of all presumptions in favour of the sys-
tem from the personal characters of those who are engaged
in it.

Defence of the First Volume. 1 1

While these considerations make the topics I have selected
the most important, they enhance the necessity of discussing
them on my own peculiar plan ; for nothing short of irresisti-
ble demonstration will suffice to vanquish the powerful pre-
judices and, willing credulity, with which I have here to
contend.

In the preliminary chapter of the first volume, the general
plan of the work was opened. The most important novelty in
it was that which has been already noticed ; an engagement
to establish every fact controverted on the part of the colonies,
which I should have occasion to adduce, by the evidence alone
of their own assemblies, witnesses, and parti zans.* The un-
dertaking may have seemed more bold than prudent; and was
certainly quite gratuitous ; for the testimony copiously given
by eye-witnesses on my own side of the controversy, if be-
lieved, is decisive : and on what rational ground can confidence
be generally denied to it ? — I might most reasonably have
claimed for such evidence at least, a great deal more credit than
is due to that of our opponents ; which has for the most part
come from persons as deeply interested in the representations
they made, as a prisoner at the bar is in his plea of not guilty j
while to the credit of the many anti-slavery witnesses and
writers, who have described the system from their own personal
knowledge of it, no fair or specious objection can be made '■>
unless, indeed, some of our railing antagonists are right in as-
suming, as they seem to do, that religion and philanthropy
predispose men to calumny and falsehood. But I chose wholly
to decline such testimony; because I was anxious to place out
of all possible doubt in fair and reasoning minds, the real na-
ture of a system, which owes its toleration, by this humane and
liberal land, chiefly to darkness and delusion.

The self-prescribed restriction was fully adhered to through-

* Vol. I. p. 10, 11.

12 Defence of

out iny former volume. I kept, indeed, considerably within
its promised limits ; for my engagement did not restrain me
from citing evidence on the anti-slavery side, in confirmation
of any facts which I had previously shewn to have been ad-
mitted by colonial opponents ;* and I might have given to such
facts much greater effect, by adding the language of willing,
to those of reluctant witnesses ; but this was a right from the
use of which, though reserved to myself, I in general ab-
stained.

The desired effect on the minds of my readers was, I trust,
not wholly lost. I know that some of them, who had doubted
before whether negro slavery was so very odious and cruel an
institution as its opponents represented it to be, declared their
full conviction on that subject. — There was seen to be in the
barbarous and iniquitous laws by which the state was framed
and maintained, enough for its condemnation ; and enough
also to prove that its practical character, under masters who
made and retained such laws, and pertinaciously opposed their
repeal, must be extremely oppressive and severe. It was seen
also, how little credit was due on such subjects to the colonial
authorities, and to their most respectable agents in this coun-
try ; since it was shewn that they had not scrupled to mis-
represent, in the boldest and grossest manner, before the Privy
Council and Parliament, in their defence of the African trade,
almost every canon, and every principle, of their then existing
slave law.

My book, though it certainly obtained sufficient attention
with the colonial party, long remained unanswered. It seemed
as if seeing themselves convicted of public misrepresentation
and imposture, as well as of a truly barbarous spirit of legis-
lation, out of their own mouths, and by their own records.

* It may be best to transcribe here the words of the engagement itself.
" It is on such evidence (the colonial) that I shall chiefly rely; nor shall
" I assume the truth of any statement adverse to the colonial system that has
" has ever been controverted, however unimpeachable the testimony may be
" on which it stands, until I have shewn it to have been directly or indirectly
" confirmed by the same decisive evidence, the concessions of the colonists
" themselves." — Vol I. p. 10, 11.

The First Volume. 13

they despaired of parrying the attack ; and thought silence
the best resort • for nearly three years elapsed without any
reply, until the repeated remarks of anti-slavery writers, who
inferred that my statements were tacitly admitted, pushed
their opponents into a different and desperate course.

Expedients of the foulest kind were then adopted ; such as
attempting to discredit my statements by partial and mu-
tilated extracts from them, calculated not only to conceal
their true sense, but often to convey a different or opposite
one ; and by citing in a like partial and fraudulent way, the
public records to which I referred, in order to furnish out an
apparent refutation.

Such practices, when a man's purse is assailed by them,
are commonly repelled by a terse piece of controversy called
an indictment; but when not his bond, but his book, is the
subject of this crimen falsi, though its purpose is the execrable
one of cheating helpless and wretched multitudes out of their
only human hope, the compassion of the British people, there
is no possible remedy that I know of, except requesting that
those readers who possess the book and the answer, and have
access to the documents referred to, will take the trouble of
collating them with each other.*

* The work chiefly here referred to is entitled, " A practical view of the
" present state of slavery in the West Indies, or an Examination of Mr.
" Stephens' Slavery of the British West India Colonies. By Alexander
" Barclay, lately and for twenty-one years resident in Jamaica." — Its readers
must have strong faith if they believe the author's account of his life and
occupations, and at the same time that the work was his own. It is cer-
tainly a most erudite and able piece of controversy for a Jamaica overseer ;
whose life had been previously spent in the labours, not of the pen, but the
whip. The colonial writers have derided justly enough the appellation of
" book-keeper," by which the occupation is dignified in that island, though
both writing and reading are foreign to its duties; but Mr. Barclay may
raise it hereafter, perhaps, to the higher title of " book-w«Aer."

We are desired further to believe that this volume, of 456 pages, was com-
posed by Mr. Barclay for his amusement on his passage from Jamaica to
England; in consequence of his having fortunately chanced to put on board
my book among others for his entertainment on the voyage ; and that the
greater part of it, as given to the public, was written out before his arrival,

14 Defence of

This indeed is a remedy of which, with many or most of
those who were gratuitously supphed with the pretended an-
swer, I could not have the benefit ; because it did not appear till
long after my former volume had ceased to be procurable by
purchase. I might, it is true, reprint here the many inisre-
presented passages, together with the deceptious extracts
and replies ; but this would -be to rate too highly the reader's
patience, and impair his attention, perhaps, to matters of
much more importance than my defence against such an an-
tagonist. I will content myself, therefore, with exposing a
few of the many instances of his extreme unfairness, when my
subjects lead to the notice of them ; leaving the reader to
judge by such specimens of the rest.

I may, however, avail myself here of a summary mode of
defence which some fellow-labourers in this cause long since
volunteered on my behalf, against the vague general charge
of inaccuracy, which the work called Mr. Barclay's, and
others that followed and cited it, had made against me. The
authors were challenged to maintain that charge, by pointing-
out a single instance that could fairly support the impu-
tation. * They were repeatedly defied to do so ; and at
the peril of their o*vn credit ; being told that their declining
it would be regarded as retractation. Yet they have all re-

(see the preface). By some happy coincidence with this preternatural fa-
cility of composition, he must have found on board a large library of con-
troversial works on slavery ; besides the other books to which he refers.

Who can sufficiently admire the good fortune of the West India Com-
mittee, in finding that long desideratum, a reply to my Law of Slavery,
thus fortuitously and wonderfully supplied, by a mere volunteer; and by one
who could furnish from his own experience and unquestionable authority,
the facts of which they were so much in need, in order to grapple with the
evidence of their own testimony and their own records !

But though they have thus been rescued from the expence and tlie diffi-
culty of authorship, they must not escape from its responsibility. They
have so strongly accredited, and so widely circulated the work, that I shall
till they disavow it, take leave to treat it as their own.

* See the Anti-Slavery Monthly Reporter of November 1826, No. 18;
and that of June 1828, No. 37.

The First Volume. 15

niained silent : with the exception of one, who explained
away and virtually gave up the charge, by resorting for the
impeachment of what I had shewn to be the law, to what he
had assumed, on Mr. Barclay's or such like authority, to be
the practice. Palpable though this evasion is, it will be
found to pervade nearly the whole of what has been boasted
of as a full answer to, and refutation of, my former volume.

As I mean to adhere, in the continuation of my work, to
the same plan of demonstration that I have hitherto pursued,
it may be proper to notice some general objections that have
been made to my mode of conducting it.

By some of my antagonists, or one of them at least, it is
held unfair to cite against the colonial party, the statements
of their known agents, witnesses, and accredited partizans,
unless I adopt the whole of their testimony, however false
and inconsistent (see Barclay, p. 3,4.); which is, in effect, to
require that I should treat the evidence of my opponents as
if it were my own ; and to impose on me a rule that would
make my plan of demonstration utterly hopeless and ab-
surd. He who calls a witness must, 1 admit, take the whole
of his testimony together, and either support its consistency
or forfeit its benefit; but in relying on an antagonist's evi-
dence, I have a clear right to use any of the facts it fur-
nishes, without admitting the rest : and even to reason from
its inconsistency, against its general effect.

This undeniable controversial right I certainly have used,
and shall continue to do so. I shall prove, for instance,
from details furnished by my opponents, the shocking and
opprobrious truth, that the slaves on sugar plantations are
forced to work from sixteen to eighteen hours per diem ; re-
garding the preposterous general statements by the same
persons, that the labour of these poor drudges is leisure and
mere pastime when compared to that of the English pea-
sants, as what I am at liberty to pass unnoticed ; unless when
I choose rather to cite them in order to shew their utter
falsehood and effrontery.

Another objection has been made to my former volume
which is contrary not only to reason but to fact. I have been
charged with quoting, as still in use, cruel and opprobrious
ancient slave laws, which have become obsolete ; and some

16 Defence of'

that have actually been repealed, for the sake of unfairly im-
puting to the colonists of the present aera, a harsh and bar-
barous spirit, that prevailed at a former distant period, but
had long ceased to exist.

The charge is utterly groundless. It is true, indeed, that
among the laws which I cited and digested, many were not
very modern ; but their true dates were not withheld. The
oldest and worst of them, in several colonies, had their origin
in his late Majesty's reign : nay, some of the most revolting
were passed within the present century. — That every act of
assembly which I quoted of an earlier date than 1788 re-
mained then in force, appears incontestably from the printed
compilation of them as existing laws, made in that year by
a Committee of the Privy Council, in its Report on the Slave
Trade; from which, with very few, if any, exceptions, all my
abstracts of an anterior date were taken.

Nor did I represent any of those laws as unrepealed, which
I had not good reason for believing to be so ; for the as-
semblies have not been slow to take credit here for every
improvement, real or ostensible, in their slave codes ; and all
acts of that description having been from time to time trans-
mitted and laid before Parliament, and printed, at several
periods between 1788 and 1823, when my former volume
went to press, I carefully reviewed them, and left no repeal
or material alteration unnoticed.* Further collections of
new slave acts in different colonies have been since printed
by Parliament; and if a new edition of my first volume
should be called for, the assemblies shall have full credit in it
for any good enactments they have recently made ; though I
have seen very little indeed in them that goes to redeem the
character of their legislation in any degree, by more than
ostensible reforms.

Nor did I omit to give them credit for the practical disuse
of severe laws still in force, when J knew it to be due to them,
though that candour has been ill repaid.f

* See a note in my preface to that volume, page 48, 49.
f Among the many gross misrepresentations, for instance, of their much
extolled champion, Mr. Barclay, I am vehemently arraigned in reference to

the Fi/sf Volume. 17

Though it is untrue tliat I availed myself of any repealed
or obsolete law to discredit unflurly the existina- slave codes,

my statement, tliat tlie law gives any property which the slave may acquire,
to his master, though the proposition is undenied and undeniable, for what
is called " a most barbarous attack on the West India character." It is as-
sumed that in stating this, I imputed to the masters in general a cruel use of
that right; though the insidious commentator himself found it for his purpose
afterwards to quote, from the immediate context in my work, the following
paragraph : — " // is, indeed, alleged by the Colonial partij, that though the
" master is legallij entitled to all the proper ti/ acquired bij the slave, he never
** asserts that title ; and, with a few exceptions, I believe the proposition to be
" true. The slave's little property is, indeed, sometimes seized bi/ way of
" punishment, or as a mean of obtaining restitution of property suspected to
" have been stolen from the master ; but upon purely sordid principles, I re-
" member only one instance of such an exercise of the owner's power; and in
" that his conduct was generally condemned." (See Barclay's Practical \^iew
of the Present State of Slavery in the West Indies, p. 47, 48. See also,
and compare, my former Volume, p. 60 — 62.)

The reader may be curious to know how my antagonist could possibly
hope to sustain his imputation ; and yet avail himself of such a context. The
honest stratagem was this : — I had shewn from an instance given by one of
the witnesses of the slave-trading party, that in Africa the law was so differ-
ent, that the slaves often possess great property, while the masters them-
selves are sometimes poor; and that, nevertheless, that property is so fully
protected by the laws, that a slave had been known to offer to give the price
of a hundred slaves for his freedom, which the poor master fain would
have accepted, but was prevented by the local law; because the slave having
not been born such in the country, but purchased, he could not be en-
franchised.

The use I made of it was merely to shew, by an obvious inference, ano-
ther important contrast between the British colonial, and the African hnv, —
viz. that the African master had not the power of corporal punishment; be-
cause if he had possessed the power of the West Indian master in that
respect, the price might have been easily extorted without the manumission.
The stricture, therefore, was manifestly on the colonial law, not on the
practice : but my opponent, artfully separating the passage from its con-
text, exclaims, " What other impression does this convey, what other is
" it meant to convey, but diat the West India planters, legally armed
" with the power of the dungeon, the chain, and the whip, use them
" to extort from their humble labourers the fruits of their industry ?
" For what purpose," he adds, " such a inonstrous accusation was brought
"forward, it is impossible to conjecture, as in the very next passage
" he acknowledges it to be without foundation." Impossible, indeed !
that I could mean to insinuate an accusation against the planters in une

VOL. II. C

1 8 Defence of the First, mid

there was one purpose for which I might very justifiably
have cited them even if they had been all repealed. The
unwritten customary law of slavery, as well as the practical
character of the state, had been grossly misrepresented by
my opponents ; and in delineating both, from a collocation
of the facts which their own evidence had furnished, and
thereby falsifying their general statements, I had more than
one powerful prepossession to combat ; for it was not easy to
believe of Englishmen and gentlemen, that they had not only
built up and still defended an institution in the colonies, more
barbarous than any that ever elsewhere existed upon earth ;
but that they had employed in its defence, before the British
Government and Parliament, the foul means of direct and
wilful misrepresentation.

Nor had my opponents neglected amply to avail themselves
of this advantage. They incessantly objected, as they still
do, to every revolting account of their system, not only the
favourable presumptions due to the natives of this humane
and liberal land, though placed beyond the Atlantic; but
the credit that belonged to many respectable witnesses who
had given very favourable, though most unfounded, state-
ments of the slaves' condition in point of law, as well as
practice.

It was highly important, therefore, to shew by authentic
records, what barbarous laws, some of the worst of which
were of very recent dates, these migrated Englishmen and

paragraph, of which I expressly and gratuitously acquitted them in the
next, unless I was insane.

This, however, is by no means one of the strongest specimens which
might be given of this author's most disingenuous commentaries. They
are to be found in almost every page of his work.

His ordinary mode of defence and refutation, is to oppose to what I stated
and proved to be the laui, that which he maintains, on his own mere asser-
tion, to be the practice ; or, at best, to adduce some idle and impotent qualifi-
cations by recent ostensible acts of assembly, which I had shewn to be
neither executed, nor meant for, nor capable of execution ; and on such
premises to charge me with having mis-stated existing and effective slave
laws, to the records of which I had referred, or unwritten rules, which I
had proved to be in general use, and recognized as customary law m every
colonial court.

Plan of the Second Volume. 19

gentlemen, when inured to the government of slaves, had
been capable of framing ; but still more so, as they were for
the most part undeniably in full force at the very time when
such favorable but false accounts were given of their slave
codes, by the colonial agents and witnesses, before the Privy
Council and Parliament. Nor would my citation of them for
those purposes have been at all unfair, if they had since that
period been finally repealed ; whereas the repealing acts
passed before I wrote were for the most part of limited
duration. Moreover, I was able to shew, that almost every
pretended mitigation or improvement subsequently made
by the meliorating acts, was illusory, or practically useless ;
that the sole object of those ostensible reformations was
to prevent the interposition of parliament; and that the for-
mer spirit of legislation, which I could not exhibit without
citing those barbarous laws, still, in some of those colonies,
openly and avowedly prevailed. But it is not true that, even
under these circumstances, I cited knowingly any law that had
been repealed or disused in practice when I wrote, without
apprising my readers of the fact.

The right of quoting former evidence, for the sake of discredit-
ing the ad verse party that produced it, is one that I certainly shall
not relinquish in this second part of my work; for the practice
of slavery was still more grossly misrepresented at the same
period, and by the same witnesses, than its laws ; and the
exposure of their errors and impostures is no unimportant part
of the duty I have now to perform.

It would indeed be necessary to cite here with some particu-
larity the colonial evidence of that period, if only for the sake of
shewing the practical nature of the system I have to describe
as given by its administrators; for we have since had none but
ex parte examinations or statements from them; in which they
have prudently confined themselves, for the most part, to con-
venient generalities; avoiding many specific details into which
they were formerly led ; and which are essential to a clear con-
ception, and fair investigation of the case. Several changes
and improvements are alleged to have taken place since the
parliamentary evidence was given ; but the truth or falsehood
of these allegations obviously cannot be shewn without com-

c 2

20 Defence oJ'tJie First, and

paring the former case, as it stood on the evidence, with that
which at present exists.

I shall for these reasons have frequently to adduce, under
the future divisions of my subject, further citations from those
very important, but now almost recondite volumes, the printed
Reports of the Committees of Privy Council, and the House
of Commons, on the slave trade.

But there is one description of evidence contained in them,
the notice of which seems most proper for these preliminary
remarks. I mean that of witnesses, whom the colonial peti-
tioners called to testify as to the general character of their
system, in respect of humanity, liberality, and mildness : for
this is a mode of defence to which, however weak and unsa-
tisfactory when opposed to specific and well-established impu-
tations, the colonists have always had recourse, with no
small effect in this country ; and my much-vaunted anta-
gonist, the respondent of my former volume, invites, or rather
defies me, in his preliminary chapter, to reply to it. He
taxes me with illiberality, and want of candour, for refusing-
credit to the planters themselves even, when so defending
their own body and their own individual conduct ; but still
more for disregarding the testimony of such men as were their
compurgators before parliament; " officers civil, naval, and
" military, in the service of Government, who had visited the
" colonies." " Many of these, doubtless," says the work as-
cribed to Barclay, " went from the mother country with strong
** prejudices ; but have they, on their return, told this tale of
" horror? Have thei/ said that the slaves are ill-treated, op-
" pressed, or unhappy ? Have they not borne testimony to
'^ the contrary ? And is there any thing so very captivating
" in the system and management described by Mr. Stephen,
" that even a person who has no interest, could not see it without
" being enamoured of it, adopting the prejudices of the colo-
" nists, and becoming a convert to their cause, against truth
" and justice."*

Very freely will I answer these interrogatories ; and more
fully perhaps, than their propounder or his employers would

R;i relay, p. .'>.

Plan of the Second Volume. 21

desire; and since he relies so much on the force of such auxiU-
aries, as to put them in his front line, for the sake of prelimi-
nary effect, it is fit that I should grapple with them at the
onset. It is true, that honorable men of the descriptions here
stated, and some of them officers of very high public charac-
ter, did come forward as witnesses before Parliament in 1790,
at the instance of the planters, to support their petitions against
the abolition of the slave trade ; and that their testimony, as
to the then condition and treatment of the slaves, was not less
favourable than that of the planters themselves. I will here
accommodate my catechist with a few extracts quite for
his purpose.

Admiral Lord Shuldham,

Q. " What has your lordship observed of the behaviour of
*' masters towards their negro slaves, in those islands where
** you have commanded."

A. " It has been mild, gentle, and indulgent in all re&pects ;
" equal to ivhat masters generally/ shew torvards their servants in
" this kingdom" *

Admiral Sir Peter Parker.

Q, " What did you observe of the behaviour and treat-
" ment of masters towards their slaves in the several islands
" where you have been ?"

A. " From the best observations I could make, their treat-
" ment was lenient and humane. I never heard oj' even one in-
** stance of severitu toivards a slave during the xvhole time I was
'* on the Jamaica station." (This he stated to have been more
than four years.)

Q. " Did the slaves in general appear to be properly fed
*' and clothed and lodged ?"

A. " The^ not only appeared to me to be properly fed, clothed
" and lodged, but were, in my opinion, in a ?nore comfortable situ-
** ation than the loiver class of people in any part of Europe ;
*' Great Britain not excepted."

Commons Report on the Slave Trade of 1790, p. 404.

22 Defence of the First, and

Q. " Did it appear to you that more labour was required
" of the negroes than they could properly bear ?"
"A. *' Bi/ no means."*

Sir Archibald Campbell, Knight of the Bath.

Q. " What have you observed with respect to the conduct
" of masters towards their negroes in Jamaica?"

A. ''It appeared that it was marked by great kindness and
" humanitij."

Q. " Did it appear to you that their treatment was mild
" and humane?"

A. " It did."

Q. " Did they appear to be properly fed, clothed and
" lodged."

A. "They did." t

Lord Rodney, Admiral Gardner, Sir J. Dalling.
and other Officers gave accounts hardly, if at all, less favour-
able of the general system.

Admiral Barrington, being asked, " What have you
*' observed of the behaviour of masters towards their ne2;ro
'* slaves in those islands where you have commanded ?"
answered, " Always the greatest humanitij ;" and afterwards
added, " they seemed so happy that he had wished himself' a
" negro.^'%

I will add extracts from the evidence of only two of the
planters, who were examined at the same period ; and among
scores of eminent ones who spoke strongly to the same laudatory
effect, will select gentlemen of that description who had filled
high official situations in the colonies ; and had much per-
sonal acquaintance with the practice they described, on their
own estates.

Sir Ralph Payne, afterwards Lord Lavington, twice
Governor of the Leeward Islands, and proprietor of se-
veral estates in Antigua and St. Christopher.
*' / trust I do not hazard a contradiction tvhen J say that

" there is no slave, at least none that I ever saw, the severity of

* Commons Report on the Slave Trade of 1790, p. 477.
i Ibid. 451. I Ibid. 405.

Plan of ihe Second Volume. 23

" whose labour is by auy means comparable to that of a day la-
*' bourer in England.'^

Q. " Did the slaves in general appear to be properly fed,
** clothed and lodijed ?"

A. " Most uiujuestionably they did.''*

David Paury, Esq., for seven years Governor of Barbadoes,
and Proprietor of estates in that Island.

Q. " What have you observed of the behaviour of masters
" towards their slaves?"

A. " Every possible kindness, care and attention.''

Q. " Is not their treatment remarkably gentle and hu-
" mane?"

A. " Certainly, so."

Q. " Did it appear to you that more labour was required
" of them than they could properly bear ?"

A. " Not nearly so much as I think their owners had a right
" to demand ; and the common labour of the negro there would
" be play to any peasant in this country. "f

How satisfactory, how truly honorable to the planters of the
Sugar Colonies, was such evidence ! No wonder that it
deeply impressed the British Parliament, and contributed
mainly to the protection of the slave trade against the efforts
of J'anaiics and enthusiasts, adding thereby seventeen years of
protracted life, and enormous extension to that beneficent
traffic ; for be it observed that these testimonies refer to times
when the trade was in full vigour ; and though no small part
of the negroes whose situation and treatment are here de-
picted, must have been recently imported Africans, now called
by the colonial writers '' savages," and, " rude barbarians," and
therefore, we are told, unavoidably subjected to a rigorous dis-
cipline ; for no distinction was made by these well-informed
observers, between their condition, and that of the Creole
slaves. All were treated with equal tenderness, and all equally
content and happy, if these accounts were true.

What a pity is it that the planters were ever bereft of a

* Commons Report on tlie Slave Trade of 1790, p. 435.
+ Ibid. 464.

24 Dejeme of ihe First, ami

trade that produced such benignant effects ; converting by
millions the barbarous and hapless natives of Africa into the
enviable condition here described, and furnishing their mas-
ters with an endless succession of new objects for the exer-
cise of their benevolence, liberality, and self-denial! The
only drawback on the happy consequences was, that the lives
of those fortunate beings, the new negroes especially, though
merry, were found to be short : but this, no doubt, was the
effect of that excess of kindness and indulgence which pam-
pered them too much, and added indolence to repletion.
The speedy loss of twenty-five by the lowest, and fifty by
other estimates, in every hundred, by their " seasoning" into
ease and luxury, might detract, indeed, from the priidei/ce of
their planting benefactors ; but added to the praise of that
unexampled benignity, which made slavery, instead of its
proverbial wretchedness in other countries, a state to be envied
not only by our free peasants, but by a British admiral !

Having thus taken up the gauntlet thrown down by Mr.
Barclay, and fairly given to the planters the full benefit of
that disinterested and honorable testimony, which he chal-
lenged me to answer; I must now take leave to place under the
eyes of my readers some accounts much more recent, and of
rather a different kind.

** Prior to the abolition of the slave trade, no planter of any
" candour could deny that the evils of the system icere great.
" No sooner, however, had this measure been accomplished, than
" the ivhole mode of treatment changed," &c. " Immediately
" subsequent to the years 1807 and 1808, care and attention on
" the part of the master commenced.'" *

How, Mr. M'Donnell ! ! ! commenced after 1807 ! Strange
anachronism ! Why, seventeen years before that period, they
had attained the ne plus ultra of maturity and perfection —
" The whole mode of treatment since changed" ! It has been a
sad revolution, then, for the poor slaves ; since we are assured
on such high authority as it would be " ilhberal and uncan-
did to doubt," that they were before treated with " every possible

* Considerations on Negro Slavery, &c., by Alexander INl'Donnell, Esq.,
Sterotary to tlie Committee of the Inhabitants of Denierara, p. 200.

Phin of the Second Volume. 25

kindness, care, and attention.'^ The change could be only
for the worse ; and an entire change must have been the
entire substitution of neglect, harshness, and severity, for con-
summate " care, humanity, and kindness."

Who, it may be asked, is the writer that thus oversets
the whole case so well got up by the West India Committee,
and so well attested before Parliament, in 1790 ? Who is
the bold man that thus ventures to give the lie to all that a
hundred respectable planters then alleged, and all that their
honorable witnesses confirmed ; telling us that " no planter of
any candour could deny'' what they all stoutly did deny ; nay,
called other men liars for asserting? It is no other than one
of the best accredited colonial champions of the present day.
It is Mr. M'DoNNELL, the secretary to the general committee
of all the inhabitants of Demerara, constituted for the pur-
pose of opposing the reformation of slavery proposed in 1823
by His Majesty's government ! I cite the passage from a
work written and published by him as their official organ ;
and which has been very extensively and gratuitously circu-
lated in this country by that fourth estate of this realm, the
West India Committee, or its members. Nor is it by this single
passage only, that he thus renounces and repudiates their
former case. I have extracted it, among many others in that
work to the same effect, only as one of the most compendious.
It is in truth the main drift of his arguments, to persuade
the people of this country that the cessation of the slave trade
has given birth to, and will progressively mature, without their
further interference, the mitigation and cessation of slavery.
He affects systematically to distinguish various different stages
in the process, to the first of which he alleges the state has
already arrived ; and admits that up to the abolition in 1807,
slavery existed in its worst degree of severity. *

Many other are the colonial authorities that have contradicted
not less directly the evidence of 1790. Dr.ColHns'willbeshewn
to have done so in every particular, as well as in its general effect.
But I will cite here only one testimony more ; and it shall be
that of the very antagonist who has been hardy enough to defy
me to this review ; even Mr. Barclay himself!

* Seep. 204. to 227.

26 Defence of the Firat, and

He, like Mr. M'Donnell, plainly admits that at the time
when the respectable witnesses here quoted, represented the
condition of the slaves as being so happy and enviable, and
for seventeen years later, the work of mitigating its extreme
rigour had not even begun ; and ascribes the origin and pre-
tended progress of it to the cessation of the African trade.
" T/teJirst stage of improvement is by far the most difficult to a
" rude and barbarous people ; but the progress that the negroes
" have already made is far from inconsiderable. No person who
" saw the situation of the slaves in Jamaica tiventi/ years ago
" (i. e. fourteen years after the evidence of 1790) could have
" believed it possible that so great a change for the better could
*' have taken place in so short a period."*

Certainly not, if the testimony I have cited was true ; for
no such change was possible.

He proceeds to specify the improvements which he alleges to
have taken place ; contrasting them in parallel tables with
what he admits to have been the former case. I will not follow
him fully into his particulars here ; because several of them re-
late to parts of the system not within the scope of my present
work, and any which may fall within it, will be noticed in the
proper places hereafter. But I will extract two or three of
them, as fair samples of the whole.

" When savage Africans were pour- ", It is now limited to 39 stripes,
" ing into Jamaica, &c., the master's " to be inflicted by order and in
" power of punishing his slaves was " presence of the master or over-
" little restrained bylaw; and was " seer, and 10 by subordinate
*' exercised to a great extent by the " agents : and, comparatively speak-
" subordinate white people and " ing, is but seldom required at all.
" drivers. " There is not now one punishment

" for twenty that were inflicted fif.

" teen or twenty years ago.
" Ten years ago chains were in " Tliey are now entirely abolished.
" common use on the plantations, for
" punishing criminal slaves.

" For cruel and improper punish- " Now they are manumised, and
" ment, slaves had formerly no ade- " provided with an annuity for life ;
" quate redress. " and magistrates are appointed a

" council of protection, to attend to

" their complaints.

* Barclay's Present State of Slavery, &c., Introduction, p. 21.

Plan of the Second Volume. 27

" Twenty years ago, there was " Now they are nearly all bap-
scarcely a negro baptised in Ja- " tised."

maica.

I will not suppose any of my readers so totally ignorant of
the public discussions on the subjects of punishments and re-
ligious instruction, as to stand in need of being informed or
satisfied that the improvements here alleged, are all either
frivolous or wholly unfounded in fact. I might otherwise refer
to my former volume under the proper titles, for expositions of
their nullity or absolute falsehood ; and appeal for my confir-
mation to volumes of official documents now before the public
in Parliamentary papers.

The other improvements alleged by him are of a like decep-
tious character. But while I protest against all Mr. Barclay's
propositions in his second column, I thank him for his admis-
sion in the first. They confirm me in many statements in my
former works, the truth of which has been loudly denied ; while
they shew in almost every particular, how grossly deceived the
respectable witnesses of 1790 were in their eulogies of negro
slavery.

In saying they were " deceived^' as far at least as relates to
the naval and military officers, I desire to be understood se-
riously and literally; beijpg far from supposing that they did
not sincerely entertain the very erroneous opinions they gave.
Nor is it hard to explain how officers, or other strangers, may
visit the West Indies, or even stay there a considerable time,
and return with impressions as to the general treatment of
slaves, widely remote from the truth.

From Mr. Barclay's suggestion, that such men doubtless
go from this country with strong prejudices adverse to the co-
lonists, I must wholly dissent. The very contrary I know from
much observation to be the truth. The fact is, that naval and
military officers, usually carry to the West Indies a preposses-
sion of which their hospitable entertainers, the slave masters
there, do not fail to avail themselves, and which greatly fa-
vors the universal policy of all the proprietors they associate
with ; that of keeping from the eyes of respectable strangers
the more offensive parts of the system, and studiously contriv-
ing to bring within their notice, whatever may seem to make for

28 Defence of the First and

its credit. This prepossession, is a notion that the planters suf-
ferinpubhc opinion unjustly, /"///oMgA the popular odium attached
to the use of the whip, which their own professional experience
has taught them to be necessary for maintaining subordination
and discipline; or which at least they believe to be so. Some
of themselves, perhaps, have incurred unmerited censure on
that score ; and may consequently be the more ready to sym-
pathise with those whom they are taught to regard as victims
of the same popular prejudice.

Reflection, indeed, might suggest to them the essential and
fearful difference between a power of corporal punishment in-
trusted for public purposes, to honorable men, who have no self-
interest, real or imaginary in abusing it; and the same, or a
far wider discretional power, placed in the hands of vulgar and
sordid men, unrestrained by any sense of honorary or legal
responsibility, and whose gains depend on the strict per-
formance of laborious services which the whip is employed to
enforce. If it were the duty of soldiers or seamen to work
hard for the private benefit of their officers, and the power of
corporal punishment without a court martial, were given to the
latter for enforcing that duty, the two cases would be less
widely different ; but to give them a further approximation,
the boatswains, and Serjeants and every other petty officer,
must be armed with the same authority, and have an interest
also in its use. We must also divest the superior officers of
their elevated professional feelings; and suppose that the sole
object of their occupation is gain.

Nevertheless, the prepossession here noticed, is not always
or generally corrected by such reflections. It would effectually
be so, if the interior discipline of a plantation were exposed
to the view of such guests as these ; but they see as little of
it in the houses of their pubhc or private entertainers, as a
respected visitor in this country does of the family discipline,
and ordinary economies, of his host; or the treatment of paupers
in a neighbouring workhouse. The only slaves brought within
their notice, are domestics in their holiday dresses; and if faults
are committed by these, the punishment of them is of course
postponed till their departure. As to the field negroes, they
may be seen perhaps at their work in the cane pieces by the
passing stranger; but the drivers are loo well instructed to use

Plan of the Second Volume. 29

their whips in his presence. Still less can he learn, without a
prying curiosity that would be highly offensive, the excessiv(;
times of their daily and nocturnal labour, and the scanty
amount of their weekly allowances of food, the articles of
oppression in which I shall shew that their worst ill-treatment
consists.

If these difficulties of observation are doubted, I beg leave
to refer to the following extract from a work lately published.
It comes from an apologist of the system; otherwise of course
I should not use it. He is also one of those writers whose style
has been the most useful to the bad cause they support,
and the most mischievous to that of the unheard and un-
fortunate slaves ; for he affects, in a very specious strain, mo-
deration and a mediating spirit ; admitting in a small degree,
and with laboured palliations, abuses too notorious to be
denied; and chidingthose who call oppression and inhumanity
by their proper names, or exhibit them in their true dimen-
sions, as intemperate partizans.* He is, like all such writers,
a professed friend to humane improvements, but would post-
pone ad Gracas Kakndas, the emancipation of the slaves, f
t must nevertheless do him the justice to say that he writes
with ability; and fairly enough acknowledges some truths that
his fellow-labourers have boldly denied.

Speaking of a gentleman who was making a tour through
the Leeward Islands to obtain information on these subjects,
he has the following passage.

" An individual must possess a greater share of discern-
" ment than falls to the lot of most observers, in order to put
" it out of the power of an interested guide to deceive him,
" unless his opportunities for observation are constant, and
** unrestrained by ceremony. The true condition of the slaves,
" upon an estate which might be governed with the grossest
" abuses of humanity, would not be made apparent to the
** casual visitor, if it were contrary to the wishes of his con-

* Observations upon the State of Slavery in the Island of Santa Cruz.
&c. ; published by Simpkin and Marshall, 1829. See especially his
strictures on the Edinburgh Review, &c. 70, 71.

t Ibid. 86.

30 Defence of the First, and

" ductor or host. Means could be easily resorted to, which
" would compel even misery to cast aside its semblance, and
" to wear the temporary guise of content. It may probably
" be attributed to the difference between visits of social fes-
" tivity, and those of a settled and ordinary reception en
" famille, that evidence so much at variance with the facts,
" and yet tendered with a perfect conviction of its truth,
" should have been given by many individuals of high rank
** during the discussions which preceded and led to the abo-
" lition of the slave trade. ' We do not wash our linen before
" strangers,' was the coarse but pithy observation of one
" whose knowledge of human nature was both extensive and
" varied : nor is it reasonable to suppose that planters feel de-
" sirous that their visitors should see slavery in its worst
" colours; or witness the painful exhibitions which are seldom
" entirely dispensed with upon the best governed plantations."*

I heartily wish that these remarks, the obvious truth of
which might recommend them, even had they been made by
an anti-slavery pen, were transcribed, and delivered with his
commission or instructions, to every governor or other public
officer sent to the West Indies, who happens fortunately to be,
what they all ought to be, unattached by property or connec-
tions to the cause of the planters ; and that they were enjoined
to make no official reports as to the general condition and
treatment of slaves, until they had lived at least a year in that
country, after the long round of festive entertainments which
always follow their first arrival.

Even those sacred office-bearers, who are now sent to the
sugar colonies, may stand in great need of such cautions.
They might, in one instance, have prevented a Right Re-
verend Prelate from committing himself inextricably as an
apologist of slavery, almost as soon as he had touched the
shore of Jamaica; and shutting out most effectually from his
own ears, truths which others took good care to keep from his
eyes, by at once engaging as his private chaplain, the most
active and violent public champion of slavery that the island
contained.

* Observations upon the State of Slavery in the Island of Santa Cruz,
Sec, p. 5.

Plan of the Second Volume. 31

Another Right Reverend Prelate, for whom I feel very high
respect, might also have escaped the premature formation and
avowal of views, which I am persuaded he has already in
great measure corrected,* and will, if his valuable life is
spared, ere long find cause to reverse. If so, his brief error
will probably redound to his own honor, and the benefit of
the oppressed multitudes committed to his spiritual charge ;
for I know his character too well to doubt that when fully de-
livered from those delusions which the concurrent assertions,
and systematic artifices, of all who were admitted to his society
unavoidably impressed upon his mind, he will frankly ac-
knowledge and disclaim them. He will not be less candid
and manly in this respect than that gallant officer. Governor
Arthur; who, though when he first visited the West Indies he
was a warm friend to the anti-slavery cause, or, to quote his
own term, " a perfect Wilberforce," became, soon after his
arrival, so complete a victim to the ordinary arts of the slave
masters on the spot, that he hastened expressly to retract his
first opinions, and bore spontaneous testimony, in his official
dispatches, to the exemplary general humanity that prevailed
in the colony over which he had come to preside.

Soon, however, did experience teach him how grossly he
had been imposed on. He found that practices existed exten-
sively under his own immediate government, more cruel and
atrocious than any that his original views had ascribed to co-
lonial slave-masters ; and that the general spirit of the com-
munity made it impossible to suppress them. A second con-
fession of error was of course mortifying enough ; but he did
not hesitate to make it, and freely to retract, in a letter to the
Colonial Minister, his former retractation. f

Though I have been led thus largely to explain, injustice
to the eminent naval and military officers whose errors my an-
tagonist has compelled me to expose, the sources of their

* My chief reason for so thinking is, that his lordship has now the
honour of being abused in that ordinary gazette of the slave-masters — the
Morning Journal ; and other publications known to be in their employ-
ment and pay.

t The correspondence is in the official papers printed by orders of 6th
June 18ir, p. 115., and 16th June 1823.

32 Defence of the First, and

deceptions testimony; and thongh I sincerely regard the blame
of it as imputable not to themselves, but to the well-informed
petitioners who called them ; let it be remembered that I have
been reasoning not to repel their evidence, but to excuse it ;
for we have seen that it has been wholly overthrown, however
inconsistently and ungratefully, by the same party at whose
instance it was given. If I have failed to shew, that the
misrepresentations of those highly respectable witnesses may
have been sincere, so much the worse was the conduct of
those who knowing;; the true case, brought them forward to
disguise it.

Here some of my readers may perhaps be disposed to ask,*' Do
" you then deny the last representations, as well as the first; con-
" tending, that no general improvements have actually taken
" place during the last twenty years ? and if so, how do you
" account for these public assertions that the colonists have
" recently made with apparentcandour, because at the grievous
" expense of their own credit, and that of their predecessors
" and co-partizans, in respect of their former evidence ?"

T will answer the last question first. The case is by no
means new. It is but the last iteration of pretences, that have
been set up as speciously, and supported by equal authority ;
and yet afterwards refuted and abandoned, at every succes-
sive stage of a controversy, that has now subsisted forty
years.

Indeed this is short of the truth ; for even in the Parlia-
mentary investigations of 1790, there was the same affectation
of candour, in the retrospective condemnation of former prac-
tices, with which the credulity of the British public has been
often since, and is now again abused. Many of the colo-
nial witnesses then admitted, that the slavery of a former
period, had been rigorous and cruel; and took credit for the
very lenient and satisfactory state at which they represented
it to have arrived, as the effect of improvements within the
time of their own recollection. In this part of their case also,
the planters were supported by some of their naval and military
friends.

Question to Commodore Gardner. " Do you think the
" slaves are better or worse treated now than they were for-
" merly?"

Plan oj' the Second Volume. 33

A. " I am confident when I say they are much better
" treated now, than they were when I first knew that island
" (Jamaica).'' *

In answer to the same question, ViceAdmiral Arbuth-
NOT said, " Beyond compurison better: in Jamaica, much im-
" proved since I first knew it, which was as long ago as in the

"year 1763." t

Here we find the era of improvements carried back to a
period now no less than sixty-six years distant. They, must to
be sure, have had a very slow growth ; since the colonists now
admit by the pen of Mr. M'Donnell, that they have not yet
advanced beyond their first stage ; but they certainly lessen
the wonder by dating the commencement of the progress, at
least seventeen years later, than when these gallant officers
and many other witnesses were called by the West India peti-
tioners to prove its consummation.

Reasonably did the planters exult over the abolitionists in
the effect of this plausible, but now repudiated testimony. It
not only gave a long respite to their beloved slave trade; but
gave colour to their long continued boast, that the humanity
of their system had been vindicated from the charges of their
opponents^ But it was because their cause was tried before
assemblies, to all the unbiassed part of whom, the whole sub-
ject was new, and of difficult investigation; and who therefore,
instead of well weighing the evidence as to the details of con-
troverted facts, probably took the easier part of judging, as
jurymen are prone to do, by the respectable and imposing tes-
timony adduced as to general character.

The slave trade, however, was soon found to stand in need
of further support ; and a stronger or fresher colonial case

* Commons Report of 1790, p. A')2. f Ibid. 410.

\ See a Report of the Jamaica House of Assembly of November 23, 1804,
which was laid before Parliament, and printed by order of the House oi'
Commons of February 25, 1805, p. 12. " The particular accusations of
" oppression without the means of redress, of avaricious and unfeeling rigour
" exercised towards bur slaves, &c., heaped upon the inhabitants of th<? Bri-
" tish West India Colonies, have hcni vf pilled and rLJutcdln/mcti irrefragable
" evidence, that they can now make little impression, except on the pre-
" judiced and uninformed."

VOL, II. D

34 Defence of the First, and

was called for to maintain it, not by the enemies of slavery,
but its friends.

The West India committee of proprietors and merchants
in this country, constituted for the purpose of upholding
that iniquitous commerce (to which we are now modestly
told the colonies had been long averse), suggested the ab-
solute necessity of parrying the further attacks upon it by
Mr. Wilberforce and his party in Parliament, by such acts of
Assembly for meliorating the state of the slaves, as might hold
out a future prospect of putting an end to the trade, by pre-
serving and increasing the native black population ; and Lord
Seaford, as chairman of the Committee, not only communi-
cated resolutions to that effect to the different islands through
their agents*, but moved for and obtained, in the House of
Commons, an address to the Crown, recommending such im-
provements.

This proceeding, which took place in 1797, backed by the
most urgent solicitations of eminent proprietors resident here,
to their friends in the islands, gave birth to most of the meli-
orating laws ; almost every enactment of which, and several of
their express recitals, were direct, or virtual contradictions, of
the evidence given seven years before.

I refer for those laws to my former volume, and to the many
parliamentary papers in which they are set forth at large ; and
dare venture to affirm that no man can read many of their
provisions without being convinced that the state so much
eulogized in 1790 was one of the most opprobrious rigour and
barbarity. The palliatory remedies prescribed, shewed suffi-
ciently the malignant and desperate nature of the case.

Thenceforth a new era, and a new source, of improvements.

* See the Resolutions at large, and some of the correspondence, in papers
printed by order of the House of Commons of the 8th June, 1804, H. 58 —
60. The second Resolution, which will suffice to characterise the whole
proceeding, was in the following terms : — " Resolved, that the question of
" abolition will continue to he agitated year after year, and as -often as the
"forms of the House permit ; and that neither the House of Commons, nor the
" country at large, will suffer it to rest till some steps have been taken which
" may afford them i^eason to believe that every regulation has been adopted
" which is consistent with the safety of the colonies^

Plan oj the Second Volume. 35

were adopted by the colonial apologists. The meliorating
hnvs, we were now told, had done every thing for the slaves
that could possibly be done ; and to every new charge and
proof of practical oppression, was opposed some specious pro-
vision of that useless and impracticable code. Mr. Barclay,
as we have partly seen, assuming the full efficacy of those idle
enactments, treats them not merely as evidence of the prac-
tical improvements he alleges, but as actually constituting
the changes from admitted precedent rigour, to present hu-
manity : and there is not one, I believe, of the recent writers
on the colonial side, who has not more or less relied on the
same mode of defence. Yet every one of those laws was pos-
terior in date to the parliamentary evidence; with the excep-
tion of the first Consolidation Slave Act of Jamaica, which had
not come into operation till the year preceding. Besides, all
the witnesses who testified so strongly from their own obser-
vation as to the then existing condition of the slaves through-
out the West Indies, had quitted that country at antecedent
periods.

To resort to these laws, then, in defending the humanity of
the system, is to put the colonial witnesses of 1790 again out
of court. To ascribe the new-born humanity to the moral influ-
ence of those laws is, if possible, still stronger : for supposing
merely ostensible and impotent laws to have any such influ-
ence, it must of course be a work of time ; yet this also has
been alleged as a cause of improvement by some writers, who
felt no doubt that they could not credibly ascribe to the me-
liorating code, in opposition to a host of proofs, any more direct
and material operation.

Even the Jamaica Assembly has, in its last manufac-
ture of what it calls evidence* as to the condition of the

* I thus describe the examinations taken by a committee of that house
in 1815, in opposition to Mr. Wilberforce's Register Bill, because I cannot
consent to treat as really deserving the name of evidence, the statements of
slave masters in defence of their own system and their own characters, col-
lected for the purpose of defeating a measure which they thought, or pro-
fessed to think, however preposterously, would be fatal to their properties
or their lives.

We have already seen, and in the course of this work I shall more

D 2

36 Defence of the I'iist, and

slaves, resorted to this indirect cause of alleged improve-'
merits. Several of the planters whose testimony is given,
asserted that the condition and sreneral treatment of the slaves

o

had been greatly meliorated, within the time of their own ex-
perience; and one of them, Robert William Harris, Esq. speci-
fied the following particulars, to which I request particular
attention.

** As to the hours of labour, when the examinant came to
" the Island the slaves were turned out full an hour before
" day, and kept out as long after dark. Their breakfast was
" always cooked for them, and they were allowed half an
" hour to eat it, and two hours to go home to their dinner.
" As the length of the days, on an average through the year
" in this climate, including the twilight, is about twelve hours
" and a half, so the slaves then worked twelve hours in the

abundantly shew, the danger of listening to such self-defensive testimony^
though given in this country, before the high tribunal of parliament, and in
the presence of an opposing party, as well as impartial judges and auditors,
and subject to the test of cross-examination, and to contradiction by
other witnesses : but in these examinations, and others of a like kind
transmitted from different colonies, all such checks are wanting. The
judges, the examiners, the auditors, and the witnesses, are all parties to
the controversy, and all on the same side ; or if any of the latter appear
by their descriptions to be disinterested, that appearance is not rarely de-
ceptions; for it does not follow that because a witness is described as a mi-
litary or civil officer, a lawyer or physician, he is not also a planter or
ov,'ner of slaves ; still less that he is not so connected with those who are,
as to have nearly an equal biass. The presumption from residence is
strongly the other way; nor have the examiners in any instance, to my re-
collection, attempted to repel that presumption, as they might have done,
were it groundless, by proper questions to the witnesses themselves.

What is more important still, a witness examined in the West Indies,
must not only be sincere and impartial, but have a degree of courage
amounting to temerity and self-devotedness, who should dare to give any
testimony on these subjects on the anti-slavery side. If such willing mar-
tyrs to the cause of truth and humanity were to be found on the spot, their
characters were, doubtless, well enough known to prevent their being called
as witnesses on these ex parte and extra-judicial examinations.

For these reasons, I shall certainly tliink it no part of my duty to state
and refute such testimony ; but the same considerations will intitle me to
cite with the greater effect from it, any facts which, though adduced to sup-
port the colonial case, may be used for its refutation.

Plan of I he Second Voiiune. 37

" twenty-four. At present the same time is allowed for
•* breakfast and dinner: but the slaves, as far as examinant
" sees, are only required to work in the field in daylight ; and
" consequently they work only ten hours in the twenty-four,
" and not near so hard as formerly.

" In respect to punishments, amelioration made its first
" stand there. As far as has come within exantinanfs observa-
" tion, the punishments of the present day hold no measure
" with former times; and are mild and oentle both in their
" natm"e and extent when compared with military punish
" ments. The manners, habits and condition of slaves have
" been greatly ameliorated since he came to the island; and,
** generally speaking, the improvement has been regular and
" progressive ; and he considers it is to be attributed to the
" operation of several concurrent causes. In the first
" PLACE, to the legal enactments and the 7noral iifiuence of the
" consolidated slave laiv. Secondly, to the increased hu-
" manity and benevolence of the proprietors, which led them
" to employ and get out people of better education, better
" principles and better connections for the planting line than
" were formerly employed in it. Thirdly, to the conse-
" quent disposition of all those in power to treat the slaves
" with greater lenity, encouraging them to be christened, and
" giving the head negroes more confidence. Fourthly, to
" their being relieved from oppressive duties they were for-
" merly subjected to, over and above the ordinary labours of
" agriculture and manufacture. Fifthly, the progress of
" improvement not having been interrupted or retarded by
" the accession of new savages, since the abolition of the slave
" trader*

Though 1 have cited the testimony of this long experienced
and eminent planter only for the immediate purpose of fnr^
ther shewing how often the dates and the sources of alleo-ed
improvements have been shifted by the assemblies and their

* Paper intitled Further Proceedings of the Honourable House of As-
sembly of Jamaica, relative to a Bill introduced into the House of Commons
&c. (Mr. Wilberforce's Register Bill). Printed by Richardson, 1816 and
widely circulated by the West India Committee and agents, p. 83 — 81.

38 Defence of the First, and

advocates, it will be found hereafter to have a substantive
importance in the question, whether there have been any
improvements at all ; and will tend much to elucidate what
I shall maintain to have always been, and still to be, the
worst and most destructive part of the whole system, the op-
pressive excess of forced labour. I pledge myself to demon-
strate that what is here admitted to have been its former, is
far short of its present amount.

But I would at present only ask my readers to observe the
dates, and the assigned causes of improvement, here alleged.
When the respectable examinant speaks of the time of his
first arrival in the island, he refers to the year 1785, or some-
what near that time ; probably his first knowledge of the
facts he specifies was later; for he had stated himself to have
resided there upwards of thirty years, and his examination
is dated the 23rd of November, 1815. But supposing him to
refer to a state of things not more recent than 1785, it would
still synchronize with that of which the witnesses of 1790 on
the colonial side gave such extremely favourable accounts ;
as they had for the most part quitted the West Indies several
years before their testimony was given, and their accounts
related to the time of their residence there. We have here,
therefore, an admission, not in general terms only, but by the
adduction of many particulars, that those accounts were un-
founded in fact.

The first cause of improvement here assigned, brings
down the former severity to a much later date ; for the first
Consolidation Act bears date the 6th December, 1788, and its
" moral injfuence" on the feelings and manners of the society,
if a real, must have been rather a distant effect. The three
next, as the reader will observe, are rather consecutive effects
than causes ; and the last, the cessation of the African slave
trade, did not come into operation till the year 1808.

Such was the new and inconsistent defence of the colonies
in 1815, when the Register Bill gave rise to new investiga-
tions as to their existing interior system.

But now their note is again changed. The Consolidation
Act, and the other meliorating laws, now are virtually ad-
mitted to have done nothing, either by their direct provisions
or moral influence, towards the improvements in question ;

Plan of the Second Volume. 39

for the present watchword of the jvarty is to ascribe them to
the abohtioii alone. Even Mr. Barclay, as we have seen, con-
curs with that other accredited and redoubted champion of
the colonies, Mr. M'Donnel, in regarding the non-admission
of " savage Africans, or of a rude and barbarous people," as
having been necessary to clear the foundation of his alleged
improvements. Even he, in affecting to contrast the present
with the past, tells us of oppressions that existed " twentif
" and ten years ago," as the strongest he could find for his
purpose.

And why this last change of doctrine ? Why not still
ascribe the good work rather to the meliorating laws, which
have had so much longer a reign ? Because the immediate
objects of the controversy are changed. Because the practical
question now is, whether the meliorating code shall be ex-
tended, pursuant to the votes of Parliament and the trouble-
some though most humble solicitations of the crown. To
hold, therefore, that such laws have been found effectual,
would be much less convenient and prudent, than to maintain
that the abolition has supplied reformatory principles and
motives, such as have already done much and will progres-
sively do all that justice and humanity require. Should the
reader not be satisfied with this explanation, let him find if
he can another.

Here let me point out, by the way, a new and glaring in-
consistency. If we suppose the colonists sincere in attributing
to the abolition the beneficent efiects they allege, and that
they really rejoice, as they affect to do, for those fruits of the
measure, how shall we account for their rancorous animosity
to Mr. Wilberforce ? The patient might as reasonably hate
and reproach the skilful physician who had healed him ; or
the penitent, the spiritual monitor who had turned him from
his sins.

Mr. Wilberforce has been an advocate indeed for humane
laws, which they allege to be no longer necessary \ but if his
indefatigable labours alone have made them so, the self-dispa-
raging, and therefore honest error, should surely be more than
outweighed by the actual and inestimable benefit received.
That he was sincere, could not be doubted ; for what man, or
what angel, would not have been elated to take to himself.

40 Defence of the First, and

if he truly could, the praise of having effectually alleviated
the galling and guilty yoke of colonial bondage ; as well as
put an end to the slave trade ! Yet, the stores of vituperative
language are ransacked by every colonial press on both sides
of the Atlantic, in the vain attempt to blast his well-earned
laurels ; and in the attempt, not vain, to gratify the malignant
feelings of slave masters towards him. Even a superior,
but young and inexperienced mind, one who, I hope, has a
moral as well as intellectual superiority to common men, and
therefore will not be ashamed to avow involuntary errors, was
so seduced by the contagious sympathies, which in a very
short and rapid tour through the islands he imbibed at every
table of his hospitable entertainers, as not only to become on
his return a volunteer apologist of their system, but to call
the now confessed author of all that he thought defensible in
it " the once glorious Mr. Wilberforce."

But I will press these remarks no further. Enough has
been said to shew, that there is no presumption in favour of
the recent and present pretences of improvement, either from
the confidence with which they are brought forward, or the
consistency of their authors, or from any apparent candour in
the confessions they involve of past and once denied abuses.

It has been well said by one of my fellow-labourers, that
oppression in the sugar colonies has no present tense ; and I
may add, that humanity has hardly a past one. Every new
defence calls every former one a cheat.

And now I will answer the other question which my readers
were supposed likely to put.

" Do I contend that no general improvement in the treat-
** ment of slaves has yet actually taken place ?" Yes; speak-
ing of the temporal lot of the field negroes, in all the most im-
portant points, and of their spiritual interests too, with few and
slight exceptions, I verily and conscientiously do. Different
degrees of severity there are, and always have been, on diffe-
rent estates, according to the various dispositions and circum-
stances of their managers or owners ; but in those grand arti-
cles, and main sources of ordinary oppression, under which
the field negroes suffer and die ; in the fatal excess of labour,
and with some local and accidental exceptions, in the penury
of maintenance also, the case in general is little, if at all

Plan of the Second Volume. 4 1

better than it was forty years ago. This I maintain; and this
I undertake to estabUsh.

Leaving the clear elucidation and proof of these views to
the following sheets, I proceed to apprise my readers more
distinctly, of the plan and limits of the work now presented
to them.

The condition of the slaves in point of law, was delineated
under three principal heads.

The slave laws were considered, 1st, as constituting the re-
lation between master and slave.

2dly. As they repect questions between the slaves and
persons of free condition in general.

3dly. As they affect the slave in his relation to the state,
as an object of civil government and protection. *

I might now, were it my wish to give a complete account
of all the practical evils and crimes that belong to the system,
follow the same divisions; for in each of these relations, the
slaves might be shewn to be practically and grievously op-
pressed. But I have already, in my account of the laws, under
the second and third heads, noticed incidentally some of their
practical effects ; and it was professed at the outset not to
be my aim in delineating this odious institution, to say all
that could truly be said against it ; but only so much as might
suffice to shew that it is too bad to be tolerated by a Christian
legislature, a moment longer than strict necessity requires, f
Therefore, and for the reasons before assigned, though I may
have occasion sometimes to notice, as connected with the rela-
tion to the master, evils that more directly belong to the slave's
depressed and helpless situation in his relations to the free
classes, and to the state itself, the practical consequences of
the master's formidable power, will be the chief subject of
the present book.

The law as between master and slave, was delineated by its
principal canons or rules; of which I distinguished twelve,!

* Vol. I. p. 32. t Ibid. p. 11. t Ibid. p. 18.

42 Defence of the First, and

but it is in shewing the mischiefs which flow from the 3d,
4th, and 5th of these, and more especially the 3d, that my
remaining labors will be chiefly employed: I will therefore re-
peat them here.

Rule 3d. The master is the sole arbiter of the kind, and de-
gree, and time of labour to which the slave shall be subjected ;
and of the subsistence, or means of obtaining a subsistence,
that shall be given in return.

Rule 4th. The master may imprison, beat, scourge, wound,
and otherwise afflict or injure the person of his slave, at his
discretion.

Rule 5th. These harsh powers of the master may all be
exercised, not only by him in person, but by his representatives
and agents of every description, and by every person, whe-
ther bond or free, who is clothed in any manner with his
authority.*

In delineating the ordinary exercise of these powers, I shall
confine myself to the treatment of the predial slaves, com-
monly called the "field negroes f not only because these form
by far the most numerous class, amounting probably to four-
fifths of the whole enslaved population, but because it is upon
them, that the slavery of the sugar colonies falls with the hea-
viest and most destructive pressure. Domestics, are likely to
suffer more from the anger, the revenge, the suspicion, and
other malevolent feelings of the master ; with whom they are
brought, much oftener than the field negroes, into personal
contact and collision ; but his avarice, that far wider and
surer source of oppression, is opposed to the comfort, the
health, and often the existence, of the predial slaves. They
are on sugar plantations, as I shall shew, universally over-

* The exceptions, and pretended exceptions, to these rules were noticed
in the proper places in my former volume ; and it would be tedious to
repeat them here. It would be equally tedious, nor is it necessary, to no-
tice in this place, such further exceptions as have been added by subsequent
Acts of Assembly, or Orders of Council. They will properly belong to a
second edition of my former volume, or " Law of Slavery," if I live to pre-
pare one. Meantime such alterations of the law as have any material con-
nection with my limited account of the practical system, shall be noticed in
those respective divisions of my subject to which they relate.

Plan of the Second Volume. 43

worked, and for the most part under-fed, not because the
proprietor is cruel, nor always because he is too greedy of gain,
but because most proprietors are necessitous ; and because all,
having acquired their estates after progressive competition
had pushed the exaction of forced labour to its present ex-
tent, they cannot, without great sacrifice of present income,
or the protection of a general law, reduce it to such bounds
as would consist with the physical or moral well-being, or ge-
nerally even with the preservation, of the slaves. I do not,
therefore, mean to describe or notice, unless incidentally and
by way of illustration, any of the oppressions under which
they suffer, except those which I hold, and have ever held, to
be the most cruel and destructive, as well as the most general
and inherent to the system, excess of labour, and insufficiency
of maintenance; in other words, those abuses of the master's
power which arise from his selfish, not his malevolent feelings.

Incidental, however, to these main topics, and inseparably
connected with a fair consideration of them, is the discipline
by which labour is coerced ; the harsh and brutalizing nature
of which greatly aggravates the ill effects of its excess, and
constitutes at the same time, a third head of oppression, not
less general than the two former, and springing from the same
ordinary motives.

My practical delineation then, will be much narrower in its
plan, though not I fear in its bulk, than my account of the
Slave Laws ; and shall be arranged as follows : —

1st. I will state and consider the forced labour imposed on
the slaves of sugar plantations in its ordinary nature and
amount; premising some remarks on human labour in the
Torrid Zone in general, and subjoining a comparative view of
agricultural labour in England.

2d. I will describe the means of coercion and discipline by
which their labour is enforced.

3rd. I will state the ordinary treatment of the slaves in res-
pect of food, clothing, and other necessaries provided by the
master.

After which, I propose briefly to review the state of colonial
slavery as thus delineated both in law and practice ; and to
conclude with some practical suggestions.

44 Of Agricidlural Labour

CHAPTER II.

OF AGRICDLTURAL LABOUR IN THE TORRID 20NE, AND
THE PERNICIOUS EFFECTS OF ITS EXCESS WHEN FOR-
CIBLY EXACTED.

The main object of slavery in the sugar colonies is the obtain-
ing, by compulsion, the labour of negroes in the cultivation
of the land.

It is maintained by the planters, that there are no other
possible means by which West India produce can be raised ;
because Europeans, as they allege, cannot, and negroes, in a
j state of freedom, will not, till the soil in that climate. The
' former of these propositions was disputed by some early wri-
ters in the abolition controversy, who were not personally ac-
quainted with the West Indies; and there are certainly some
plausible grounds for denying that it is strictly and universally
true ; but it has never been controverted by me. Nor do I
think that it can be fairly denied, to an extent material
to the practical question for the sake of which it has been
maintained ; for Europeans certainly cannot work so much
there in the tillage of the soil, without speedy destruction of
health and life, as to make their labour in the raising of sugar
a substitute that the planter can afford, while the black or
coloured race, whether slaves or free, are their competitors.

On the first settlement of our oldest West Indian colonies,
Europeans, I admit, were employed in the labours of the
field ; but they were chiefly transported convicts, or indented
servants, who worked by compulsion ; and at a time when
sugar planting, incomparably the most laborious species of
agriculture, was in its infancy, and was prosecuted to but a
small extent.

The general incapacity of white men to endure such labours
between the tropics, arises from two causes ; the noxious

ill /he Torrid Zone. 45

effects of long exposure to the rays of the sun ; and the ex-
hausting tendency of vigorous action in a highly heated at-
mosphere ; by the first of which negroes seem not to be at all
annoyed, and by the other in a niuch less degree than natives
of the temperate zones. The noontide solar blaze in that
climate cannot in general be sustained by our countrymen for
any great length of time, though in a state of rest, without
uneasy sensations, and injury to the nervous system ; while to
the blacks it is quite innoxious. The one, therefore, would
be distressed and exhausted by such a continuance or in-
tensity of field labour, as the other might, without injury,
endure.*

But in this latter point, the difference is more in degree
than in kind; for brisk and vigorous action subjects the negro,
as well as the European, to a redundant perspiration, pro-
portionate to the heat of the atmosphere in which the ex-
ertion is made; and with both, the natural effect is exhaustion
of strength and spirits. The black can work much more than
the white man in that burning region ; but cannot, without

* Let me not be understood for a moment, as giving' any countenance
here to the apologies that are made for slavery or slave trade, on the score
of this physical inferiority of European labourers between the tropics. In
a moral view, they are too preposterous for serious refutation. But the
defence, as usual in like cases, has been extended tacitly to much iniquity
that does not fall within the range even of its own bad principle. Of
indoor labours, and domestic service, our free fellow subjects of this country
are not less capable in the West Indies than negroes are; and at a former
period, the artificers and mechanical labourers in those colonies were chiefly
white men ; but now, domestic service, and almost all mechanical employ-
ments, are exclusively allotted to negroes or mulattoes ; and, for the most
part, to slaves. Though so many of our fellow-subjects here are distressed
for want of employment in various lines, and would be glad to go for it to
the West Indies on easy terms, thereby relieving us in some measure from
the evils of a redundant population, this resource is shut to them ; while
the pestilent influence of slavery on morals and manners, is needlessly and
fatally, caiTied from the fields into the parlour, the nursery and the work-
shop-
It would be easy to shew tliat the domestic slavery of the colonies has,
in its natural effects, much embittered the predial ; and that the abolition of
the one, would make the mitigation and progressive termination of the
other, a work of great facility, and perfect safety. But this is too large and
important a subject for incidental discussion.

46 Of Agricultural Labour

prejudice to health, work so much as an Enghshman of the
same bodily strength can in his native climate. The field
negro, indeed, is driven, as I shall shew, to actual exertions
far exceeding, in duration at least, any that our hardiest pea-
sants sustain in this temperate climate ; but not without the
most distressing and fatal effects.

Had the primeval curse equally affected the earth itself in
every latitude, the natives of the Torrid Zone, slavery apart,
would in this respect have felt it more than the rest of their
species. The sweat of the brow, and the sufferings of the
wearied labourer, would have been pre-eminently theirs. But
the Creator's works abound with compensatory and equalizing
expedients. The same fervent atmosphere that makes arduous
long continued labour much more irksome, lessens greatly the
need of it; by quickening the process of vegetation, and giving
to the soil with little culture a much greater fertility than la-
borious tillage will impart to it in the temperate zones. Many
nutritious fruits, grateful to the taste of man, and well fitted
for his support, such as the plantain, the banana, the bread
fruit, and the cocoa nut, are either the spontaneous growth of
the soil, or when once planted, require scarcely any further
toil, but yield perennially, a copious supply of food.

An attentive observer of the works of God in the animal and
vegetable world, might infer a priori from these facts, that in-
feriority in the inhabitants of hot climates to ourselves in la-
borious activity, which they always exhibit when their native
propensities are unsubdued by the yoke of private bondage ;
and might infer also, that such a disposition, if not carried to
H vicious excess, conduces to their physical welfare. In that
beautiful and deservedly popular work of Dr. Paley, his Natural
Theology, he has shewn in a multitude of instances, how won-
derfully seeming defects or disparities in the powers or facul-
ties of different animals, and in the provisions made for their
support and well being, are supplied or compensated by their
respective positions, propensities, and habits. All are sup-
plied with adequate means of providing for their natural wants;
but without superfluity ; so that the faculties and powers of a
particular organization in any species of animal being given,
we may generally infer corresponding and proportionate neces-
sities ; and vice versa, when the latter are known, we may be

in the Torrid Zone. 47

led to expect an adaptation of the former, antecedently to
any zoological observations of the fact. The interior cistern
of the camel, for instance, might teach us that he was des-
tined to traverse the dry deserts of Africa ; and the various
powers of the elephant's proboscis might be expected from
the unwieldy bulk of his frame.

Man, the favourite care of Providence, even in its sublunary
scheme, was destined to inhabit every region of the globe ;
and his reason, while a free agent, enables him amidst all the
diversities of climate and situation, so to fence against their
disadvantages by artificial means, as to preserve his being in
them all. But as reason and foresight, have no steady or cer-
tain influence, he is guarded also by strong instinctive pro-
pensities, against a fatal departure from those habits which
his local position demands. In temperate regions, he finds
vigorous bodily action rather pleasant than the reverse ; and
though naturally prone to prefer the stimulating employments
of the chace or war, to the monotonous labours of the husband-
man, he has no such strong aversion to these, as the rewards
of industry in a civilised state of society will not overcome ;
but in the torrid zone, his instincts are very strongly on the
side of rest and ease ; he shrinks from continuous labour on
the sultry glebe ; and delights in the shade, not only for re-
freshment but repose.

Nor is it true, as the apologists of negro slavery now in-
sidiously pretend, that these propensities belong to the inha-
bitants of hot climates only when they are in a barbarous
state ; and may be vanquished by the larger excitements of
industry in an advanced stage of civilization. In the most
polished countries of the East, the indisposition to arduous
and long continued agricultural labour is notoriously great,
and the industry of the free peasants is vastly inferior to that
of the same classes in Europe. Even the Chinese, whose
high state of civilization will not be disputed, and whose re-
dundant population imposes on them the necessity of being
industrious in the culture of their soil, form no exception to
this remark. It is clear, at least, as I shall hereafter shew,
that their labour was regarded as mere idleness by our plan-
ters, when put in comparison with that of slaves working
under the drivers ; for in Trinadad, the experiment was tried

48 Of Agricu/turul J^ahoxr

of working their sugar estates by labourers imported fr6m
China ; and its complete failure, when shewn hereafter in
the proper place, will be found highly instructive.

If these general characteristics were not too notorious to be
disputed, I might support them by the authority of many
eminent writers ; and even by that of some distinguished
champions of colonial slavery ; since they adduce as an apo-
logy for that odious institution, the necessity of counteracting
by force, these strong natural propensities of its unfortunate
subjects. They find, strange to say, a defence of the coercive
whip, in the peculiar pains and privations that it imposes on
those chartered libertines of nature, the natives of a tropical
climate. Because, from the exuberance of the soil, they need
not work hard for themselves, it is inferred, that may be justly
enslaved, and whipped into hard work for the profit of others.
The very bounty of God, is thus made a plea for the tyranny
and cruelty of man.*'

* Lest I should be supposed here to deal unfairly with my colonial op-
ponents, let me quote the language of one of them who is nearly one of
the most recent, and seems to claim a distinguished place in ])oint of au-
thority among them; I mean Major Moodi/, late of the Colonial Office, in
his reports as a commissioner of enquiry into the state of the captured and
apprenticed Africans, printed by order of the House of Commons in 1825.

As it may be supposed a departure from my rule to quote a writer so
described, it is necessary to add that he is a West Indian ; not as I believe
by birth; but by habits, attachments and connections. He was long resi-
dent in the sugar colonies, and for some time a proprietor and m.anager of
estates in Demerara; and his official reports are throughout an elaborate and
zealous defence of negro slavery. They are very voluminous, and abound
so much with passages to my present purpose, that it is difficult to choose
among them.

It would appear, from the Major's own account, that not only during his
mission, but in his previous employments, it had been the great business
of his life to lucubrate on what he stiles the " philosophy of labour" the
fundamental, and almost the only distinguishable tenet of which is, that the
natives of tropical climates disrelish agricultural labour too much to addict
themselves to it sufficiently without compulsion ; and its chief or only prac-
tical doctrine, is that slavery ought to be maintained, as a necessary mean
of raising sugar for the consumption of this country. The Major seems
originally to have doubted, though, perhaps, no other intelligent man ever
did, of the general propensity I have mentioned ; for he boasts of having

in the Torrid Zone. 49

It seems to have never entered into the imaginations of
these gentlemen, that feeUngs so strong and so general as they

taken great pains to establish it, by enquiries in different regions of the
globe.

The result, as he shews with anxious and endless iteration, is, that the
agricultural labourer in the torrid zone, is strongly indisposed to steady
exertion, not merely by the pain that it imposes from the heat of the at-
mosphere, but by the privation of greatly desired pleasures.

Speaking of the difficulty of obtaining agricultural labour from en-
franchised slaves, he says : — " Though their former habits as slaves may
" make them feel the pain of stcadj/ industry in a less degree, it is not
" sufficient that they should encounter the pain of labour in the sun ; they
" must also be able to resist the seducing pleasures afforded by repose
"in the shade — the very enjoyment which their former state of slavery
" prevented their obtaining — the enjoyment sought for and prized by all
" around them. By what motive," he asks, " are these men to be witli-
" drawn from the pleasure of repose, which has a value so much higher in
" the torrid zone than in Europe ? Any man may convince himself that
" this enjoyment of repose is a high pleasure, by honestly examining his
" own inclination for any laborious exertion in the open air, when the sun
*' in Europe radiates a heat measured by 80 degrees of the thermometer.''
— Report, 2d part, p. 55, 50 and 75, and 1st part, p. 132.

Again : " In warm climates, repose 'is one of the strongest desires of
" men." He further observes, that this propensity is by no means the
mere effect of habit, or one even the long practical controul of which will
remove its powerful influence. " In the torrid zone, where steady labour
" in the sun is painful from the physical influence of heat, time cannot
" altogether remove the pain felt, though it prepares the bodies of some
" men to endure it. No dexterity in the use of tools can diminish the
" heat of the sun's rays ; and at the end of forty years, as at the end of
" four months, the pleasure of repose in the shade is found to be most
" powerful in diminishing voluntary steady industry," &c. — Report, 2nd
part, p. 77.

From these premises the Major strangely enough infers our moral right
to persist in the use of slavery and the cart- whip, under the softening
names, which he every where chooses to give them, of " coiistraint,"
'^ physical force, '^ '■'^ coercion" and the like. He does not condescend, in-
deed, to enter into any ethical disquisitions on the subject; thinking it
enough to shew that we shall otherwise be undersold in the sugar markets
of Europe; for " if the capitalist in one colony," he justly argues,
" raised colonial produce at a greater expence, in the end the cheapest
" would drive the dearest produce out of any market wherein there may
" be a competition, &c. Any nation, therefore," he adds, " adopting a
" mode of local police, or interior government, which gave to the landed
" colonial capitalist a moral or physical force to coerce the labour of the
VOL. 11. E

50 Of Agricultural Labour

describe, might possibly have been implanted by the benig-
nant Author of our natures for kind and conservatory ends;
and that the aversion to long continued field labour in the
torrid zone might perhaps form no exception to that very
fi^eneral rule, that what is excessively irksome to our bodily
sensations, is unfriendly to health and life. Yet those who
insist continually on the importance of attending to "physical
''facts, and sneer at the advocates of the poor Africans for
neglecting them,* might have been led by experience to infer
that such is the case. The striking and deplorable preva-
lence of disease and mortality, and the rapid decline of a race
naturally strong and prolific beyond the rest of mankind,
whenever those native propensities are so effectually con-
trouled, as they are by the whip on sugar estates, might have
suggested to them that nature was probably right in this in-
stance, and relentless avarice in the wrong.

They might have adverted also to historical, as well as living
facts, comparing the exuberant Indian population of the
Antilles, Mexico and Peru, when first discovered by the
Spaniards, with their subsequent depopulated state ; and

" Africans in return for subsistence, and a moderate scale of comforts,
" would possess a decided advantage over the colonists and agricultural
" capitalists of any other nation, who should adopt a mode of police or
" government obtaining a smaller quantum of exertions for a much greater
" rate of wages or allowances," Sec. — 2nd part, p. 16.

It is plain that this gentleman thinks not only that for these reasons
the enfranchised African captives ought to be replaced in slavery, which
is the obvious and main drift of his work, but that the slave trade ought
to be restored ; for he holds that our colonies cannot raise sugar on terms
so cheap as those foreign countries in which the trade is still allowed.
" The time is fast approaching when the proprietors will be no longer
" able to produce sugar, or other articles having an exchangeable value,
" in Europe, from the competition of Foreign colonies with cheaper agri-
" culture, from their still carrying on the slave trade." — Report, 1st part,
p. 131.

If so, his principles of political economy are evidently as applicable to
the defence of slave trade as of slavery ; and they are equally uncontrouUed
by moral considerations ; unless it be more criminal to relapse into the
African trade ourselves, than to reinslave its captured victims, after we have
taken them from the foreign slave traders, under the pretext of makingthem
free.

* See the same Reports of Major Moody in a hundred places.

in the Torrid Zone. 51

recognizing in the tyranny of forced labour, when opposed
to those native propensities, the source of the appalling con-
trast.*

* Charlevoix, taking tlie medium of different accounts, supposes the
native inhabitants of St. Domingo, when first discovered by the Spaniards,
to have been about a million and a half. He agrees with all other writers
in describing them as the happiest and most amiable of mankind. — Histoire
de St. Domingo, liv. i.

Mr. Washington Irving, in his very valuable work recently published^
A History of the Life and Voyages of Columbus, has given a very particular
and highly interesting account of their character and manners ; and of
the commencement and early progress of that forced labour by which the
avaricious tyranny of the Spaniards soon effected their entire extermina-
tion. Unfeeling, indeed, must be that mind, in which their sad story, as
told in his pages, fails to excite the most lively emotions of pity and in-
dignation.— See especially, book. ii. chap. 10; and book viii. chap. 7.

" Deep despair now fell upon the natives, when they found a perpetual
'* task inflicted upon them. Weak and indolent by nature, unused to
" labour of any kind, and brought up in the untasked idleness of their soft
" climate, and their fruitful groves, death itself seemed preferable to a life
*' of toil. The pleasant life of the island was at an end ; the dream in the
" shade by day, the slumber during the sultry noon-tide heat by the
" fountain or the stream, or under the spreading palm, tree, and the song,
" the dance and the game in the mellow evening, when summoned to their
" simple amusements by the rude Indian drum. They were now obliged
" to grope, day by day, with bending bodies and anxious eye, along the
" borders of their rivers, sifting the sand for the grains of gold, or to
" labour in their fields beneath the fervour of a tropical sun, to raise food
" for their task-masters. They sunk to sleep, weary and exhausted with
" the certainty that the next day was to be but a repetition of the same toil
" and suffering. Or if they occasionally indulged in their national dances,
" the ballads to which they kept time were of a melancholy and plaintive
" character. They spoke of the times that were past, before the white
" men had introduced sorrow and slavery and weary labour among
« them."

The terrible and fatal consequences are narrated by Mr. Irving with
great particularity, and in a like impressive style. They resist while re-
sistance is possible ; they fly to their mountain tops and woods ; but are
every where pursued and slaughtered, or brought back by their remorseless
and indefatigable oppressors. They perish by thousands from hunger,
fatigue, and hardships of every kind ; till at length opposition is effectually
quelled ; and they submit in despair to that cruel and murderous drudgery,
or, in the style of our philosopher of labour, to that " steady industry"
of which death is the slow, but sure result.

E 2

52 Of Agricultural Laboitr

Modern Hayti, in its reversal of the barbarous experiment,
has sufficiently taught the same important lesson ; for there
the depopulating power of death, and the driving whip re-
tired together. Notwithstanding all the destruction that the
most sanguinary long continued insurrectionary wars — wars
waged at last for the very purpose of extermination, could
effect ; in spite of systematic massacre, and all that blood-
hounds, and hell-hounds, could do to reduce the black popula-
tion, the tide of human life has risen there again to its pris-
tine flood mark ; and promises soon to overflow. No change
of those immoral habits to which our planters would ascribe
the sterility and morality of their slaves, has taken place in
Hayti ; so, at least, they themselves would anxiously persuade
us ; and there is no increase in the comforts of life, as we are
told on the same authority ; but the driving whip is banished ;
forced labour is no more ; and nature, restored to her rights,
convicts the past slavery of murderous oppression, by the
evidence of her multiplying powers.

Let me not, however, be understood to mean that the labours
of the field in the torrid zone are injurious to its natives when
moderated to that degree which the climate fairly demands.
There is a point of muscular exertion there, as well as here,
up to which men may habitually work, not only without pre-
judice, but with positive benefit to health ; and the love of
rest, like every other natural propensity, may every where be
indulged to a pernicious excess. All that I would immedi-
ately deduce from these remarks is, that immoderate labour,
in that region of the earth, is extremely noxious to the human
frame, as well as pre-eminently irksome ; and that repugnance
to it is a salutary instinct, implanted in the mind of man by
the Author of our natures, for the security of health and life.

What degree of labour may be sustained there, or in any
climate, without pernicious effects, is obviously not to be
ascertained theoretically by any general rule. The diversities
of age and sex, and strength of constitution, and of previous
habits, with their various combinations, and of local circum-
stances, friendly or adverse to health and strenth, are endless ;
and if a medium of them all could be found, experience would
still be the only criterion to decide how much of labour in
point of intensity and duration may consist, under ordinary

tn the Torrid Zone. 53

circumstances, with the physical well-being of a workman of
average powers. But even the lessons of experience can
furnish no rule of safe application to individuals whose ex-
ertions are forcibly constrained. The labourer himself, indeed,
may be pretty surely taught, by his feelings of fatigue and ex-
haustion, when he has worked beyond the just measure of his
strength ; but his employers or observers, can rarely know
with certainty, except from the destructive consequences of
excess, whether his exertions have been limited by necessity,
or by choice ; by a just regard to self-preservation, or by
indolent self-indulgence.

If the latter proposition be true, the inhumanity of exacting
labour from innocent men by coercive force, imposed for the
profit and at the discretion of their masters, is a plain corollary
from it. The im poser of the toil, supposing hirn even a dis-
interested assessor of its amount, could not be sure that it
was not excessive ; and yet excess is likely to prove a very
cruel, though slow paced, species of murder.

I speak here especially, with a view to such present force
as the labourer cannot resist or avoid ; like the cart whip in
the hand of a driver. Among the gross and puerile sophisms
to which the apologists of West Indian slavery are obliged
to resort, they confound in their defences of the driving
system, moral with physical coercion ; and gravely observe
that the free labourer also, is constrained to work for the sub-
sistence of himself and family : one sufficient answer, to
which, if such a miserable fallacy deserves any answer at all,
is that the instinct of self-preservation is too strong to be
easily subdued, either by the love of comfort or the fear of
want : though it yields to present pain, or nearly impending
torture. We do not find, in this industrious land, that our
agricultural peasants work themselves to death for wages
however high : we hear often of their distress for want of
work, but never of their perishing from its excess ; whereas
the fact that men and women very often sicken and die from
overwork on sugar plantations, is fully admitted, and quite
beyond dispute.* The merciless drudgery which Major

* This will be abundantly shewn in subsequent chapters ; but lest the
proposition should startle uninformed readers at the outset, T here subjoin

54 Of Agricultural Labour

Moody calls the *' steady imlustrt/' of the cane pieces, has
always thinned the black population of our sugar colonies, far

some extracts from that veiy important work of Dr. Collins, his " Prac-
" tical Rules for the Management and Medical Treatment of Negro
" Slaves in the Sugar Colonies." It is a work, that I have referred to in
my former volume ; and shall often have to cite in the following sheets. It
may be proper, therefore, to shew this author's superior claims to at-
tention ; and my right to quote as decisive authority what he states on
the anti-slavery side. They were noticed in the first volume of this work ;
but as that has long been out of print, it may be useful to repeat them
here.

Dr. Collins was a physician, and planter, of great eminence and ex-
perience, who had resided great part of his life in the West Indies, and was
proprietor of valuable sugar estates in St. Vincent's, which he sold after
retiring to this country. He wrote a pamphlet in defence of the slave
trade ; and to the last sided with its apologists ; as appears even from the
work I quote. But when Mr. Wilberforce's efforts for the abolition
seemed to be finally frustrated, Dr. Collins compiled and published this
work with the humane intention of pointing out to his brother planters
such abuses in the treatment of their slaves injurious to health and life,
as he deemed not essential to their system, and therefore hoped they
might be induced to reform.

Hence and certainly not from any desire on his part to cast odium on
a system which he had long administered, and wished to uphold, the im-
portant testimony he aifords on the anti-slavery side. He could not sup-
press those facts of the case on which it was his object to advise; but he
notices them as a friend, not an enemy, of the general system ; and always
with the utmost tenderness and extenuation; at least, such is his usual
style when the abuse he is pointing out is one of a general kind.

From these circumstances I presume it has happened, that Dr. Collins,
though often quoted against the planters, has hitherto riot been treated by
them like most other writers on whose testimony their practice has been
arrai'^ned. I am not aware, at least, that he has been traduced and vili-
fied or that his authority ever has been questioned by any of their hired
writers or partizans : some of them have expressly admitted it; and Mr.
Hibbert the agent for Jamaica, had the liberality and humanity to pub-
lish a new edition of the work ; the same from which I now transcribe.

There are so very many passages in this work that shew the truth of the
shocking proposition to which this note is annexed, that I find selection
rather difficult. His strongest statements as to the fatal effects of forced
labour refer to the treatment of newly imported Africans, which may be
thought not strictly relevant to the existing case ; but for my present pur-
pose they are emphatically so ; as the effects of the first imposition of
forced labour, on men who had been previously governed by those strong
native propensities described by Major Moody, will shew most clearly and

in the Torrid Zone. 55

more than all other modes of oppression, and all the diseases

fairly, how it operates on the the human frame ; and if the driving whip
could controul at once those, powerful propensities, notwithstanding their
habitual indulgence, and the resistance of oppressed nature united, its power
will not be doubted to be an over-match for the latter alone.

" Experience," says Dr. Collins, " has demonstrated that a great number
" of the negroes exported from the coast of Africa to the West Indies, die
" within three or four years after their arrival there. I believe that the
" most moderate calculation cannot rate the loss at less than one fourth on
" an average. In certain cases it may not, perhaps, be so great ; but in
" others it is infinitely greater ; whole lots of ten or twenty having very
" few survivors at the end of that time," (p. 51). After noticing some me-
dical causes of this shocking mortality, he adds, " Labour is another, and
" the most frequent cause of the mortality of new negroes ; some of whom
" have never experienced any considerable portion of it in their own
" country; and none in the manner in which they are obliged to work in
" ours. The inuring them gradually to labour, so that they may undergo
" it in continuation, is the primary object, and greatest difficulty, in their
" seasoning ; for to press for sudden and unremitted exertion, is to kill
" them; which many unfortunately do every year " (p. 60).

" Your new subjects," he says in another place, " will not have been
" long in the field, before they will exhibit a very different appearance from
" that which they had before they went there. If they have made any ex-
" traordinary efforts, as many of them will do from the beginning; they
*' will have grown much thinner. This is the natural consequence of exer-
" tion to which they have not been accustomed, and the consequent waste
" by perspiration ; and need not alarm you, if they are otherwise well and
" in spirits ; but if they are languid and dispirited, you must indulge them
" either with a total remission of labour, or with such an abatement of it
" as circumstances may require," (p. 78). " In the first year they get rid
" of the effects of the passage and the change of situation ; but the result of
" continued and hard labour is most felt after a longer interval, and your eye
" must be diligently directed to them for some years," (p. 81, 82).

It is not, however, among the neiv negroes alone that the destructive ef-
fects of forced labour are noticed by Dr. Collins. His chapter on labour
shews throughout that this is, in truth, the grand source, not only of the
cruel discipline which the slaves of the plantations are afflicted with, but
of the diseases which conduct them to the hospital and the grave. He
ascribes much of the mischief, indeed, to the indiscriminate manner in
which the force is applied. " The exertions required of them should be
" proportioned to their faculties, which vary greatly in different subjects,
" some being capable of doing a great deal more than others. This seems
" not to have been sufficiently attended to in the distribution of labour, as
" it is usual to divide the negroes of an estate more according to their ages
" than their abilities ; power being inferred from age. The consequence

56 Oj' the probable Excess

of the climate, and all the vices adverse to longevity and pro-
pagation, taken together.

" of which is either that the weaker negroes must retard the stronger ones ;
" or your drivers, insensible of the cause of this backwardness, or not weigh-
" ing it properly, will incessantly urge them, either with stripes or threats,
" to keep up with the others ; bi/ which means they are overwrought and
" compelled to resort to the sick-house J" (p. 175, 6).

If the reader is ill-informed enough to suppose that the driving method
of coercion is not still applied in the same indiscriminate way, or is not
still copiously destructive of health and life, I shall in the proper place fully
prove to him the contrary ; but I need offer no further evidence here, to
shew that, though men do not work themselves to death by moral constraint
in this country, they are to use Dr. Collins's term " overwrought,'^ and to a
deathful excess, by physical force in the colonies.

of forced Labour in l/ie Sugar Colonies. 57

CHAPTER III.

THE HIGH PROBABILITY THAT THF- AMOUNT OF FORCED
LABOUR ON SUGAR PLANTATIONS IS OPPRESSIVELY
AND DESTRUCTIVELY EXCESSIVE, DEDUCED FROM THE
NATURAL TENDENCY OF THE SYSTEM; AND CONFIRMED
BY THE DECLINE OF POPULATION AMONG THE PRE-
DIAL SLAVES,

Section I. — Natural Tendencies of ' the System.

Though the proper medium between an indolent deficiency,
and a pernicious excess of exertion, cannot be certainly ascer-
tained by any general rule, applicable to all cases and circum-
stances ; yet where the labourers are free, experience suppUes
a criterion accurate enough for ordinary use. When wages
are sufficiently high, and still more when there is a competi-
tion for employment, it will be known how much labourers
can commonly do, consistently with self-preservation and
health, by what they actually perform. Hence a custo-
mary standard has arisen between the employers and the em-
ployed. The English farmer knows by usage, and so does
the labourer too, what is a fair days' work at the different
seasons of the year : the one will not be content with less, and
the other will yield no more. A labourer may be too feeble
from age or constitution to work up to the established stand-
ard ; but then he must be content to receive less than ordi-
nary pay.

Slavery, and its forced labour, preclude that fair and safe
adjustment. There may be a customary quantum of work ;
but as the usage has grown from the compulsion of the mas-
ters, not the volition of the slaves, we cannot infer from the
generality of its performance, that it can be easily or innox-

58 Of the probable Excess

iously endured. If there are any securities for its moderation,
they must be found in the motives of the master, not the self-
conservatory feelings of the enslaved labourers themselves ;
yet it is by the latter alone, that the capacity for exertion
can be measured, without danger of fatal mistakes.

Unhappily, the personal experience, and physical sympa-
thies of West Indian masters, can in this case furnish no
criterion vi^hatever. Many of our English farmers have them-
selves held the plough, and thrown the flail ; they can
judge, therefore, in a great degree of the powers, and the
feelings of the labourers, from their own; but as white men
are strangers to the toils of the field in the West Indies, they
can form no judgment from their own sensations, of what
their negro slaves can, without much suffering, and abrevia-
tion of their lives endure. They know only, that the negro
has a very different constitution from their own; and can sus-
tain a degree of exertion under the solar blaze, which to
themselves would be intolerable, and speedily destructive;
and this naturally leads, especially under the suggestions of
avarice, to much exaggeration. The potential range of capa-
cities far surpassing our own, is likely to be magnified by
the imagination, even without the bias of self-interest. Men
of gigantic stature, were anciently supposed able to put
armies to the rout; and to perform those wonders of muscular
strength, which are ascribed to Hercules, and other fabulous
heroes of antiquity. The learned, in an illiterate age, were
as liaturally thought to be endued with preternatural powers.
So, also, when the hardy strong-built negro was first brought
from Africa to the new world, his masters, from the same
propensity, exaggerated in their ideas his powers of enduring-
labour, beyond all rational bounds. Even Las Casas seems
not to have apprehended, that avarice might over-tax the
strength of this new drudge, as it had fatally done that of the
less vigorous Indian. Experience, indeed, progressively proved
the mistake ; but under a concurrence of other circumstances
adverse to health and life ; and till its awful lessons were given
in the cane-pieces, as well as the mines, they did not so clearly
shew, that the main cause of mortality was excessive labour
alone. Nor were the French, English, and Dutch settlers,
among whom, that grand curse of Africa, sugar planting in

of forced Labour in the Sugar Colonies. 59

the West Indies, originated, easily convinced of an error, by
which their immediate gains were promoted ; and the ill effects
of which their slave trade promptly repaired. The excessive
estimates of the masters, therefore, as to the poor negro's
capacity for labour, were left to be corrected in the sugar
colonies, as in Spanish America, by long continued fearful
experiment alone. The limits of his possible endurance, were
found only by forcing him to that which he could not endure ;
as we ascertain the utmost capacity of a vessel, by filling it
till it overflows.

Though every planter was left to assess the labour on his
own estate at his discretion, the effect of its assessment by
all, on the same general principle of taking the utmost that
compulsion could obtain, was such an uniformity of practice
upon almost every estate, and in every sugar colony, as upon
any other premises, it would be very hard to account for. If
justice, or humanity, or policy, or a provident regard to future
and permanent interests, had adjusted the limits of exaction,
of course the practice of forced labour would have varied so
greatly in different places, and at different periods, as not to
be reducible to any general customary standard.

But a customary standard there is ; and one of singular
uniformity in all the sugar colonies, British or foreign; as
clearly appears in that which best admits of mensuration, the
time employed in work. Nor has there been any variation in
it, as I shall shew, in the British West Indies, at least, since
the first public investigations of the subject, now near forty
years ago. Whether that standard is a moderate and humane, or
an oppressive and destructive one, is the most momentous
question at issue between the friends, and the opponents of the
system ; and its close examination upon evidence, will be the
chief business of the following sheets.

The distance between the conflicting general statements on
this point, is of no ordinary width. — It is not a mere diffe-
rence of degrees ; but extends to the most opposite extremes.
While it is maintained on the one side, that the slaves on
sugar estates are grievously distressed, worked down, and
destroyed by excessive and incessant labour, it is stoutly
alleged on the other, that their work is mere pastime ; and
that they enjoy a superabundant share of leisure, recreation.

60 Of the probable Excess

and repose: representations of which, sufficient specimens have
been given in a former chapter.

Let us first enquire, then, which of these statements is the
more likely, from the nature of the case, to be true ; for in every
question that involves disputed facts, it is the best preparative
for rightly weighing the evidence, to determine first on ad-
mitted premises, if we can, on which side probability lies.

If the controversy turned merely on the actual quantum of
work in point oi time, such a preliminary enquiry might well be
spared ; for this I shall be able to establish by direct and irre-
fragable proofs to be truly enormous; and antecedently to ex-
perience, I should have thought that fact enough for my
purpose; but the modes of labour, and most of the attendant
circumstances, being little known, and ill conceived in Europe,
the case is open in those respects to fallacious representations,
of which the colonial apologists have very artfully and amply
availed themselves ; and I have lived to see how little impres-
sion is made in this case by the best authenticated and most
undoubted facts, though demonstrative of gross oppression,
upon minds biassed by self-interest, or preoccupied by favorable
or extenuatory views of the colonial system, derived from the
sources of prejudice to which I have before adverted.

Let me not, then, be thought cither diffident of the posi-
tive proofs I have to adduce, or regardless of the reader's time,
if I endeavour to dislodge these prepossessions in the present
instance, by shewing that the general excess of forced labor
is a highly probable imputation, and the bold pretences of
liberal forbearance in that respect, utterly incredible, from the
very nature of the case.

To avoid extreme terms, and put this preliminary question
in the simplest form, which is the more likely, that the labour
generally exacted by sugar planters from their predial slaves,
should fall short of, or that it should exceed, that measure of
exertion, which the latter, consistently with their well-being,
can yield.

That the master's immediate self-interest, is more directly
and apparently opposed to any error on the lenient, than on
the oppressive side, is sufficiently plain. The planter's object
is to extract wealth from the soil by the labour of his slaves ;
and his profits, ceteris paribus, must be directly proportionate

of forced Labour in the Sugar Colonies. 61

to the quantity of work they perform. To require less, there-
fore, than they can yield, would be a present sacrifice of the
potential gain ; and it is not easy to believe that such a sacri-
fice has been usually and generally made.

If a farmer, or manufacturer, weie to say that he willingly
and habitually remits to his workmen a considerable portion
in point of time, or exertion, of the work he is entitled lawfully
to demand from them, we should distrust his sincerity ; and the
assertion would be thought the more incredible, the greater the
number of his workmen was known to be, and the larger the
expence of labour, in proportion to the gross returns of the
manufactory, or farm. But the sugar planter, who is both a
farmer and manufacturer, who constantly employs a hundred
or two hundred slaves, or more, and whose expences in
acquiring and sustaining them, bear a very large proportion to
the value of his produce, tells us that he remits much of the
labour, which he might fairly exact from them ; and expects
to be believed !

If the English manufacturer were, by patent or otherwise,
the sole maker and vendor of the article he deals in, such a
statement from him, though strange, might not be quite in-
credible ; for he might, possibly, indulge himself in a lavish
liberality without any ruinous effects ; raising the price of his
article so as to make up for the value of the labour wastefully
remitted and lost. But if there were, and had long been, a
multitude of competitors in the same manufacture, for the
same markets, and if competition had already produced the
usual effect of reducing the returns of the business in general
to the lowest average of profit for which it could be carried
on, we should see that the statement involved a solecism in
political economy, and could not possibly be true. His less
liberal rivals must long since have driven him from the mar-
kets, and obliged him to desist.

If to avoid this obvious objection, the manufacturer should
add that all his brother manufacturers, multitudinous thouoh
they were, practised the same liberality, the moral improba-
bility would increase, as the commercial paradox was soft-
ened ; and the latter, after all, would not be solved, unless he
could extend the assertion to all past as well as present, and
to foreign as well as British, competitors. It must always and

62 Of the probable Excess

every where, have been the strange rule, in this branch of ma-
nufacture, to accept fewer hours, or days of labour, than the
workmen had bargained and been paid for ; because the eco-
nomy of predecessors would otherwise have so far reduced
the price of the fabric, as to have left no room for such gene-
rosity in the existing class. The market they had succeeded
to could not have afforded such a sacrifice.

To the case of our planters, the same principles clearly and
strongly apply ; for the difference made by slavery is in this
respect a difference only in form ; though in other views it
highly enhances the improbability of what they allege. If
we substitute for the manufacturer's right by contract to a
given portion of labour, the planters' power and legal right to
exact from the slaves all the labour they can possibly be com-
pelled to yield, the two cases will be found to be the same ;
and it will be as difficult, upon the most certain principles of
political economy, to believe that any needless abatement is
generally made in the latter case to the slaves, as that in the
oldest and best contested branches of manufacture at Bir-
mingham, or Manchester, the masters having a right by con-
tract to six days' labour in the week, and ten hours in each
day, are content with five and nine ; or pay for piece-work
twenty per cent, more than the workmen have contracted to
accept.

Though our planters allege to the people of England, that
the asserted liberality is general, or has few exceptions in the
British West Indies, I do not recollect that any of them
allow, and some of them strongly deny, the same liberality to
their competitors in the foreign colonies : yet upon indisput-
able principles, applied as we have seen, by Major Moody to
this identical case,* the more rigid economies of those foreign
competitors, must have imposed on the British planter, a ne-
cessity of departing from it, and exacting a full measure of
work from their slaves, in order that they might meet their
rivals on equal terms in the foreign European markets.

The same, though not so obviously, must have been the
effect of a full or extreme exaction of work by the predeces-
sors of our present planters in the English colonies, and those

* See supra, p. 50.

of forced Labour in the Sugar Colonies. 63

from whom they have bought their estates ; *' not so obvi-
ously," only because it is not sufficiently known and consi-
dered, that sugar plantations themselves are commercial com-
modities, which pass with great frequency from hand to hand,
at prices governed by the profits they have been recently
known to yield. Consequently the thrift of the sellers, in
pushing the faculties of the slaves to the utmost, must im-
pose an economical necessity on the buyers, of practising a
like frugality. The gang that produced a hundred hogs-
heads of sugar, by whatever severity of labour, must be made
to produce as much still ; or the investment, though made at
a fair price, will turn to a loss. Now, that the liberality in
question did not heretofore exist, and that on the contrary an
undue exaction of labour prevailed in our colonies, I have
shewn to be no longer in dispute.

I shall demonstrate, however, to my readers hereafter by
direct evidence, that if labour was excessive, twenty or even
forty years ago, it is so still. I shall shew that in this
respect at least, there is no general change for the better.*
But I am reasoning now a priori, on premises which my an-

* Mr. Barclay, in his enumeration of improvements, and contrast of the
past with the present, has alleged no such change.

Mr. Dwarris, in a pamphlet published by him, is one of the most strenu-
ous assertors of recent ameliorations in the treatment of the slaves in the
sugar colonies ; and he undertakes, in answer to a supposed question, to
specify in what they consist ; but this Jamaica planter (for such I under-
stand he is, though a commissioner lately delegated by government to en-
quire into subjects like these) does not insert in his catalogue any mitiga-
tions of labour ; though he looks back over a period of thirty years, to find
other changes for his purpose. (The West Indian question by Mr. Dwarris,
p. 12 and 14).

As this gentleman does me the honour to refer to accountslong since given
by me ; and asks triumphantly, " does my reasonable man believe the pre-
" sent condition of the islands to resemble the pictures there drawn, in any
" the slightest degree ?" I answer, that the likeness in every important
feature is as correct as ever ; and that it was denied as confidently by his
brother planters, when first taken, and in reference to the very time when
the living subject was under my eyes. I answer further, that in many
features of the system as now delineated by himself, I find the very same
characteristic deformities, though much softened in the colouring by a com-
plimentary artist ; and lastly, that many connoisseurs, whose acquaintance
with the subject is as recent as his own, and much more familiar, find
none of the dissimilitude he complains of.

64 Of the probable Excess

tagonists cannot dispute. Let them reconcile them, how they
can, with the principles I have adduced, and with credibility,
not merely the disuse of such inordinate exactions of labour
as were found destructive to the master's property in his
slaves ; but a gratuitous remission of his right to exact as
much work as he thinks compatible with their well-being ;
and a degree of liberality and self-denial on his part, that is
asserted to leave them a superfluous portion of time, for re-
creation, and the improvement of their own condition.

To estimate better the credit due to such assertions, let us
take a nearer view of that seductive immediate interest which
a planter has in extending, or at least not retrenching, the la-
bours of his slaves.

His profits, as I before remarked, must be in proportion
to the work they perform. It may be otherwise with the em-
ployer of free labourers ; for their wages may advance or de-
cline with the measure of their exertions ; but the only wages
given by the masters of slaves, are food, and other articles ne-
cessary for their support; the amount of which does not depend
on the quantum or value of the work, but on their wants
alone. It is admitted indeed, nay often brought forward in
argument by the planters, that when they themselves are dis-
tressed, their slaves are very badly sustained ; but it has
never to my knowledge been pretended, that their ordinary
allowances are raised, when the crops are either in quantity
or value increased.

Neither is that far larger cost of slave labour, the price
paid for the power of enforcing it ; in other words, the interest
on the capital invested in the purchase of the slaves, les-
sened by any diminution of the work. It may be hereafter
enhanced indeed, I admit, by the effects of any such excess as
shortens the lives of the workmen; and this may be supposed
to form a motive of forbearance, the value of which I shall soon
proceed to examine ; but we are now considering the force of
the motive of a certain and immediate self-interest, in order
to poise it fairly afterwards, against that of a provident re-
gard to distant and doubtful consequences.

That almost all the other ordinary charges of this farmer
and manufacturer, such as interest on the value of the land,
the works and buildings, salaries of managers, &c. would not be

of forced Labour in the Sugar Colonies. 65

lessened by any reduction of the quantity of work exacted from
a given number of slaves, is sufficiently obvious. Therefore
as the difference between the collective amount of all charges,
and the value of the gross produce, constitutes the planter's
profit; and as the quantity of the produce ceteris paribus,
must be in proportion to the labour obtained, the present gain
from any potential augmentation of labour, is manifestly equal
to the entire value of the additional produce raised by it. It
is so much added, not merely to the gross, but to the clear
nett returns, of the estate.

To make this clearer, let it be supposed that from an
estate which has cost, including the works, buildings, slaves
and stock, 20,000/., a hundred hogsheads of sugar are an-
nually produced, by a degree of labour not amounting to
excess ; and that they yield, on the balance of the consignee's
accounts, 20/. per hogshead, or 2,000/. in all, which is 10/. per
cent, on the capital employed, and that the planter's annual
expenditure is 1,200/., or 6/. per cent, so as to leave him a
profit of 4/. per cent, or 800/. as a clear return on his ca-
pital.*

It is manifest, that if, by encreasing the labour of the slaves,
the estate can be made to produce one fourth more, or 1 25
hogsheads, the augmentation of the balance of nett proceeds
in the consignee's accounts, will be 500/., making 2,500/. in
all, or 12a per cent, on the capital, liable only to the same
deduction of 1,200/. for annual expenditure, and leaving the
planter 1,300/., being a clear return of 6^ instead of 4 per
cent. The increment of labour, and of gross value, is but
one fourth, while that of the planter's profit is five-eighths, of
the former amount ; and the temptation to excess, is the
power of raising his clear income from 800/. to 1,300/. per
annum.

I am far from meaning to convey the idea that an aug-

* Though these hypothetical data may be wide of the truth without
affecting the argument, most of tliem were stated, on high colonial au-
thority to be the actual averages of capital, charges and returns in ordinary
times. — See the Report of the Committee of the House of Commons on the
Commercial state of the West Indies, 1807.

VOL. II. V

66 Of' the probable Excess

mentation of labour by one fourth part, is now within the
power of the planters. It has long since ceased to be pos-
sible to increase its ordinary quantum in any very material
degree ; as I shall ere long, I trust, fully satisfy my readers.
But I am reasoning here, against those who hold the con-
trary, affirming, that the slaves still have much time and
potential exertion to spare.

Let us, however, apply the same calculations, on the same
data, to the case of a planter, who, thinking the ordinary
standard of labour excessive, should lessen it by one-fourth
part ; throwing out so much of the cane land, before under
the hoe, as would reduce his average crop from 100 hogs-
heads to 75. His nett proceeds would then be reduced to
1500/., giving a surplus of no more than 300/. beyond his
annual expenditure, or a return of only 1 1 per cent, on his
capital.

I am not unaware of what an enemy to reformation may
be here disposed to remark. Upon these premises, he may
say, the planter cannot materially reduce the labour of his
slaves without ruinous consequences, unless they are indemni-
fied by the public. But neither can they, nor do they, proceed
in their present course, without meeting those consequences as
certainly and almost as generally, though by other and guilty
means; and perhaps by a slower and intermitting process.
Ruin, as I have more than once before publicly remarked and
proved, is the natural lot of those whose entire capital is in-
vested in sugar estates, and whose solvency depends on their
returns. There are individual exceptions ; and pretty numer-
ous periodical ones in particular colonies, from temporary
causes ; but such is the ordinary case; and I could name
islands in which, at the present moment, ruin is so universal,
that it is difficult to name an estate (in a certain island I am
credibly informed not one is to be found) that is not in the
possession of creditors, or receivers appointed for their use.

Nor was the case, in a general view, ever materially differ-
ent. If any man doubt it, let him examine the colonial
authorities referred to in the appendix to my former volume.
Let him read, for instance, the reports and petitions of the
Jamaica Assembly, there extracted, embracing a period of near

of forced Labour in the Sugar Colonies. 67

50 years, from 1772 to 1811. What stronger pictures of
comprehensive and perennial ruin than they contain can be
imagined ! Reasonably did the honourable assembly say in
one of them, that " a faithful detail would have the appearance
" of a frightful caricature."

If the general ruin of the sugar planters can fairly be
alleged to form a claim on the mother country for indemnity,
the claim is already irresistibly strong ; and if the evil being
imputable to her, is a necessary concurrent ground, we cannot
deny its existence. More justly might she be' charged with
compensation for having so long tolerated and maintained
an iniquitous and ruinous system, than for attempting to re-
form it. Besides, are not the people of this country already
paying the smart money with a lavish hand ? What else is
the high price extorted from them as consumers of sugar, for
the benefit of the planters, and through their parliamentary
influence alone, by a barefaced monopoly, after all their
former pretences of reciprocity have ceased ? But I have
inadvertently broken in upon a subject that more properly
belongs to a future division of my work ; my present business
is with the causes and virulence of the disease ; not with the
means, or the price of its cure.

If these views of the subject do not make it, in the highest
degree, probable to my readers, that the ordinary exaction of
forced labour is not abstemious, but excessive; it must be
because, perhaps, they look to the master's permanent in-
terests, in the health and longevity of his slaves, and in the
maintaining of their numbers by native increase, as a counter-
poise to the present temptation ; or else because, perhaps,
they rely upon his humanity.

As to the favourable presumption deduced from the per-
manent interests of the master, it is a consideration which
the apologists of slavery have been in the constant habit of
adducing, and relying on for near forty years ; though the
argument has a hundred times been answered, by irresistible
appeals both to reason and experience. Never was it more
speciously advanced, or more confidently insisted upon, than
during the twenty years of controversy on the slave trade ;
a period now abandoned to us, as one of indefensible rigour

F 2

68 Of the probable Excess

and neglect ; and when a provident attention to the pre-
servation of the slaves was confessedly yet unborn.*

As to the new motive for sparing them, arising from the
abolition, which my opponents now artfully, though most in-
consistently, allege to have given birth to humane improve-
ments^ it could be new only in its degree ; and in that respect
even its novelty was small ; for there never was a time in
which the destruction of the slaves by excessive labour and
other oppressions did not manifestly tend to the future ruin
of the planter. The African slave-market was proverbially
the grave of his fortune and his solvency. All the colonial
witnesses and writers, before the abolition, strongly attested
this truth ; and it was one of the very few points in which
they were both unanimous and sincere. Why, then, did not
planters, at that time, generally use proper means for the pre-
servation of their gangs ? For causes that equally exist at
the present day ; because they were then, as now, for the most
part men in needy and embarrassed circumstances, who could
not make the present sacrifices necessary to that end, especi-
ally that first and most essential one, a diminution of forced
labour, without immediate or speedyruin. Itwas because they
preferred future, to present, and contingent, as they hoped it
was, to certain evil ; because also, then as now, proprietors in
better circumstances were in general non-residents, and left
the management of their estates implicitly to men who had no
permanent interest in the preservation of the slaves, but a
present and highly influential interest in the magnitude of
the crops, and consequently in the amount of the labour ;
lastly, it was because absent proprietors were then, as now,
easily deceived, and resident ones not rarely deceived them-
selves, in respect of the true causes of mortality and sterility
among the slaves ; and the proper means of correcting those
evils.

But let us look for a moment at the general nature of the
boasted security for good treatment in the prudent regard to
self-interest, even by independent and well-informed owners.

Is it an ordinary feature of human character, to resist pre-

See p. 14 to 27, supra.

of Juiced Labour in the Sugar Colonies. 69

sent temptation, from a provident and adequate estimate, of
the distant evil, that may ensue from yielding to it ? In
other words, are prudence and self-denial more common than
the opposite defects ? and if we can justly thus compliment
human nature in general, can we fairly ascribe the same
characteristics to the gentlemen of our West India islands ?
Many of their own body, and many of their eulogists, would
contradict us if we did. Their general proneness to indulge
when here, in expences they can ill afford, whether we call
it, with their friends, spirit and generosity, or with their cen-
sors, imprudence and extravagance, is quite proverbial ; and
in no part of the earth is the transition from opulence, to in-
digence and ruin, a twentieth part so common as it confes-
sedly is among the proprietors of the sugar colonies.

As to the excitement of the resident planters to the im-
provement of their present incomes, by pushing their culture
of exportable produce to the utmost, what objects can be more
potently attractive ? They are not only the exchange of em-
barrassment for ease, and poverty for wealth ; but of sickness
perhaps, and danger, from a lethiferous climate, for health and
safety in their native land ; and above all, of the multiplied
discomforts, and privations of a residence in the West Indies,
for luxurious enjoyments in England.

Many of them have been educated, and spent the most in-
teresting part of their lives in this country ; and what is more
natural, than that they should be eager to return to it, and,
impatient of that exile, which the present insufficiency of
their crops to keep down the interest of their debts, and to
yield a surplus for the expences of a residence here, alone im-
poses on them ? How intolerable to be confined to a West
India Island, where the pleasures of the field and chase are
unknown, and almost every elegant public amusement as
much so ; where there is no theatre for ambition, or literary
emulation, and where the pleasures of social intercourse are
coarse and tasteless, when compared with those of polished
society in England ! Even the pure and tranquil enjoyments
of family affection, are often cruelly cut off, or painfully
abridged ; for he must be a selfish or very improvident pa-
rent, who does not rather part with his children, than
deny them the benefit of European education, and expose

70 Of the probable Excess

them ill their early years, to the corrupting influence of do-
mestic slavery. Under what possible circumstances, then, can
the immediate increase of income, though at the expence of
future probable loss, have a more seductive influence on the
human mind, than on the generality of planters ? The youth-
ful lover, who might obtain by it the hand of his mistress, the
slave who might purchase his freedom, if not -a. field negro,
could hardly have stronger inducements.

Yet if my opponents speak truth, all these dangerous tempt-
ations to an undue exaction of forced labour, are perfectly
innoxious to the slaves; and have served only to signalize the
self-denial and generosity of the planters. Instead of com-
petition having raised the standard, as the opponents of the
system maintain it has, up to and beyond the maximum of
innoxious endurance, it falls short we are told of a proper
medium : leaving to the enslaved labourers a superfluity of
rest, leisure, and recreation ; nay, time enough for their own
use to enrich them by voluntary industry, whenever they are
not too idly disposed so to employ it; or even to pay for
their freedom. " The great mass of planters," though con-
signed, as Mr. Bryan Edwards says, " to unremitting drudgery
" in the colonies,'' have been so abstinent, and generous, as to
forego, even a reasonable use of their only means of extrica-
tion, or relief; abandoning a large surplus of disposable la-
bour, merely that the slaves might be idle, and rich if they
pleased ; while their unfortunate masters were poor, and em-
barrassed, and pining in consequence of their immediate ne-
cessities, in a painful, and life-shortening exile ! ! !

Letme not be understood as imputing to the planters in general,
that, without the impulse of urgent necessity, they wilfully and
consciously overwork the slaves, to a degree imcompatible with
their preservation. Many proprietors, I doubt not, non-resident
ones especially, are impressed with an opinion, that the ordinary
'ong-established standard of forced labour, is not more than their
slaves, if properly treated in other respects, can innoxiously
sustain. This error indeed, may seem strange ; considering
how long, and how decisively, a declining population, under
circumstances naturally the most favourable to its increase,
has attested the reverse. But unhappily, as disease and
death produced by excess of labour, have no peculiar or dis-

of forced habour in the Sugar Colonies. 71

tinctive symptoms to indicate their source ; the sickliness, and
steriHtyof agang are easily ascribed by the attorney or manager,
andeven perhaps by the resident proprietor himself, to some na-
tural or unavoidable causes; and every death, when accounted
for, is attributed to some common disease ; though in fact that
disease was but one of the many morbid forms in which a
constitution worn out by long continued fatigue and exhaus-
tion ultimately sinks.*

That the diseases of the field negroes are for the most part
those of debility,, almost every authority on the subject will
be found to attest ; but the dropsy, or the diarrhoea, &c., not
the predisposing weakness induced by the driving-whip, are
the concluding maladies that account for the loss in the
plantation bills of mortality.

If the pre-eminent loss of life, among the slaves of a par-
ticular estate, attracts attention from its absent owner, and
leads to enquiry, there are always specious explanations at
hand. The situation is unhealthy ; epidemics have prevailed ;
the negroes are vicious in their habits ; or they are given to
dirt-eating, and obia, &c. ; whereas the neighbours often
could tell a different tale ; namely, that from the inadequacy
of the numbers, to the extent of the lands in cultivation,
or other causes, the slaves had been worked harder than is
usual, and treated, perhaps, in other respects, with a severity
exceeding the ordinary standard.

Much, I admit, cannot well be added to that standard
as to time of labour; but some differences there are, as
I shall hereafter shew ; e. g. in the relays of night work ;
and competition having pushed up the general exaction
of labour to its maximum of long endurance by ordinary
frames, a small addition is naturally attended with very bad

* See Dr. CoUins's Practical Rules, in various places. In page 18, for
example, he says, " The attomies or managers unfortunately have an in-
" terest, not only distinct from, but destructive of that of the planters. The
" character of a manager is generally deduced from the quantity of produce
" which he extracts from the estate, though the loss sustained bi/ the mor-
" tality of the slaves, in consequence of his undue exertions, is sometimes con-
" siderable enough to exhaust the whole amount of his produce. In such
" cases the credit of the crops is appropriated to those who direct the es-
" tates, while the destj'uction is charged upon Providence."

72 Of the probable Excess

and fatal effects ; especially among the feebler and less healthy
individuals of the gang. When the boat swims already
gunwale-deep, an additional pound may sink it.

The extraordinary sickness and mortality, that often distin-
guish particular estates, are not, however, simply the effects of
such an additional pressure on the gangs at large, as the ordi-
nary standard will admit of, and the necessities of the owners
may demand ; but of many consequential evils, which I shall
have to notice, exemplify, and prove hereafter, as fruits of the
general excess of forced labour; and still more of any aggrava-
tion, however small, which the slaves have not before expe-
perienced. It disheartens the feeble, it excites murmurs,
and sometimes contumacy, among the strong; it multiplies
desertions, and punishments, and those distressing and diffi-
cult questions, which every manager has to decide almost
every day in the cases of individuals, who have been absent
at the driver's muster, or remiss in some appointed task,
and who allege sickness or weakness as their excuse, or as
a plea for being admitted into the sick house, instead of be-
ing sent into the field.

I refer to an Appendix to this part of ray work, as furnish-
ing a well authenticated and graphic illustration of these
remarks.

But these causes of mortality, whether ordinary or extra-
ordinary, are little known to most proprietors on this side of
the Atlantic; and when stated to them by anti-slavery writers,
they oppose to the information incredulity as willing as that
of a patient to his surgeon, who tells him, in contradiction to
the assurances of self-interested quacks, that his case requires
a painful operation. If they obtain from their agents in the
colonies, periodical returns of the births and deaths on their
estates (which is more than lately was, or perhaps yet is usually
required) and an alarming decrease is found, they rely, for in-
formation as to its causes, upon their attornies or managers ;
who are not likely to impeach the general practice, and still
less their own particular agency, by pointing out excess of
labour as the true source of the evil.

To resident proprietors, the true causes by which the black
population is kept down, cannot without wilful self-deception

of forced Labour in the Sugar Colonies. 73

be unknown ; but I have shewn that from the circumstances
they for the most part stand in, the remedy is one which they
cannot apply, without consequences more formidable than the
progressive reduction of their gangs ; and consequently, that
there is no good security in their sense of self-interest, against
their over-working their slaves. Is there a better, then, in the
other principle, which I supposed some of my readers might
rely on, that of humanity towards those unfortunate and help-
less dependents.

To those good-natured, but unreflecting readers, who may
suppose humane feelings not to be obtunded by the exercise
of a slave-master's discipline, and to be an overmatch for his
sense of self-interest in economical modes of oppression ; I
will not say, wait till you are possessed of the facts and de-
monstrations that I have to submit to you in the following
chapters of this work; for I am now reasoning only on premises
already established and undenied ; nor will I refer them to
any of the numerous cases of recent occurrence attested by
official authority, which manifest a state of general feeling
on these subjects, among the resident colonists, inconsis-
tent with the clearest dictates of humanity and mercy ; but
I will ask, where was this humanity, when the barbarous
laws, which I have delineated in my former volume, were
framed ? and where was the practice of it during the preva-
lence of the slave trade ? Surely, it could have had little place
in the breasts of men, who not only reconciled themselves
to all the horrors of that cruel traffic, including those of the
middle passage, many of which were daily exhibited to their
view ; but, to the last, pertinaciously opposed its abolition.*

* Among all the bold violations of notorious truth by which the cause
of slavery, or any other cause, has been defended, I know of none so auda-
cious and extravagant, as the assertions recently put forth, that the colonies
were averse to the African trade; and were compelled by the mother
country to adhere to it.

True it is, that among the numberless instances in which, at various periods,
they have flown in the face of the mother country, and upbraided her with
the benefits her commerce was supposed to receive from them, whenever
they had a point to gain from her, they have been able to find two very
ancient cases ; in one of which it was represented by one colony on the
North American continent, and in another by Jamaica, that they were

74 Of the probable Excess

Nor did this humanity suffice to avert from the poor African
victims, the very species of oppression now under considera-
tion, when purchased by the British planters ; for they were
subjected immediately to a seasoning, as it is called, by which
it is admitted, that at least one-fourth, or according to some
colonial writers, more than one-half, of their number perished.
And what was this tremendous seasoning ? Doctor Collins has
furnished us with an answer to that question.f It was the
very abuse, respecting the probability of which, we are now
enquiring ; the forcing them by the whip, to undergo an ex-
cess of labour, for their slow training to which, avarice would
not wait ; and which their nature could not sustain. The
humanity of the planters, in moderating the general standard
for the seasoned or native slave, if moderate it was, must,
to be sure, have been strangely capricious, and inconsistent.
They spared not the poor newly-imported Africans, in the
exaction of labour, when they were least able to bear it ; un-
moved by compassion for their recent sufferings, and painful
reverse of habits; undeterred even by a consequent frightful
mortality, averaging at least twenty-five per cent., among men
and women in the prime of life; and often much exceeding
that rate. Can we then imagine, that when use had made
such oppression less intolerable, or less destructive, at least
to the hardier survivors, these same masters sacrificed their
own present interests to humanity; and staying the hands of
the drivers, formed the standard of labour for seasoned slaves
within limits which mercy and moderation prescribed !

injured by the slave trade. They well knew there was no danger of the mother
country taking them at their word, and renouncing it ; nor did they profess to
be influenced by humanity, or any other moral consideration. But from the
first proposal of the abolition, till that measure, twenty years after, took
place, the West India colonies loaded the tables of parliament with peti-
tions and manifestoes against that righteous reformation ; nor ceased even
then to remonstrate strongly against it, as invasive of their rights, and de-
structive of their property.

The prolongation of that grand national iniquity, from 1788 to 1807, was
effected solely almost by the zealous and potent efforts of the sugar colo-
nies; and Jamaica was foremost in the too successful contest. Do they
suppose, then, that the people of England have lost their memories, and
that the records of parliament are destroyed ?

f See the extract from this work, supra, p. 55.

of forced Labour in the Sugar Colonies. 75

If the reader can believe this, his credulity must be invin-
cible ; and he may find no difficulty in believing further, that
Dr. Collins, that well-informed apologist of himself and his
brother planters, has foully, and insidiously belied them. It
may be in vain therefore, perhaps, that 1 have shewn, on his
authority, in respect of native or seasoned slaves also, that
excess of labour with its avariciously indiscriminate exaction,
have been the causes of their destruction.*

But here another staggering objection will occur; for if
humanity has moderated the quantum of labour, in which the
master's urgent immediate interests are directly opposed to his
forbearance, how comes it not to have been active also in re-
spect of the means and manner of enforcing it, in which the
opposition of his interest seems less direct and powerful?
Can any man, who contemplates the barbarities of the driving
method, as depicted by Dr. Collins,f or even in its obvious
and essential character, doubt of its unavoidable oppression,
and cruelty ? The planter's humanity, if humane he be, is
consigned to the keeping of his drivers, who are negro
slaves, and therefore, as the colonists assert, unfeeling tyrants
to each other ; and a method is at the same time prescribed
to them, which makes humane discrimination, not merely an
extremely difficult, but quite impracticable task.

It would be a very inadequate reply in support of the favour-
able presumption I am repelling, to say, that these views are
partly retrospective, as relating to a time when the slave-
trade was in use ; for by what moral charter are the colonists
of the present day exempted from the obdurating influence that
the administration of the same interior system had on their
predecessors ? and where is there any evidence of an altered
spirit in their reception of the humane suggestions so much of
late pressed upon them by the British government and legis-
lature ? Besides, the question relates to a standard of cus-
tomary labour established long before the abolition ; and I trust

* See the same note, p. 55, 56.

f Ibid. The description of Dr. Collins as strikingly confirms that which
I gave in the Crisis of the Sugar Colonies, and have copied in my former
volume, much though its veracity was disputed, as if it had been written
for that very purpose.

76 Presumptiofi of excessive Labour

it has been shewn that if then carried too high, there is the
strongest ground for presuming that it has not since been re-
duced. That presumption, however, shall soon be confirmed
by direct and positive proof.

Section II. — Decline of Population among the Slaves ou
Suga?- Estates.

Let us next enquire, whether the same probability is not
strongly fortified by the undisputed, and indisputable fact,
that among the field negroes, or common working-slaves, on
sugar plantations, there always has been, and still is, a la-
mentable loss of life, such as the reproductive power of na-
ture does not fully repair.

The best criterion of the good or bad condition of the la-
bouring classes in any country, may be found in the increase
or decline of their numbers. This I presume is a proposition,
which no man of tolerable information will deny : but it is
the most decisive, when the result is on the unfavourable side.
Such is the superfecundity of the human species, more espe-
cially among the tillers of the soil, that a rapid increase of
population may consist with very considerable hardships, and
privations ; as I fear is too much the case, in many parts of
England at this period : but that their condition is extremely bad,
may with certainty be inferred, when the reproductive powers
of nature are so far subdued, though in a climate propitious
to their constitutions, that their numbers greatly decline.

Emigrations, general famines, or destructive wars, may in-
deed form exceptions to the rule ; but from these causes of
depopulation, the slaves in our sugar colonies are pre-eminently
exempt. They are restrained from voluntary emigration ; and
are now protected by law, as before the abolition they were by
pretty general practice, from compulsory removal ; they have
no military service to perform, except on a minute scale, and
on very rare occasions : nor has any general famine been al-
leged to have occurred in any colony, during a long series of
years. Yet the decline of numbers, among the predial slaves,
has always been deplorably great; and still exceeds any measure
of the same calamity, that is elsewhere to be found, under or-

from the Decline of Population. 77

dinary circumstances, in the history of tnankind. In the last
six years, comprised in the official returns laid before parlia-
ment, viz. from 1818, to 1824, the loss amounted to 3 per
cent.*

But these general returns furnish a very inadequate view of
the loss among the common field negroes ; because they in-
clude the domestics of every description, the slaves em-
ployed in various occupations in the towns and ports, and the
tradesmen or artificers and head-negroes on the plantations,
who are neither driven, nor overworked, and among whom it
is notorious, the domestics especially, there is much longevity,
and a very considerable native increase.^ A discrimination
in the returns, between these different descriptions of slaves
would be highly interesting and important.

That the loss of numbers is pre-eminently great or ex-
clusively found among the field-negroes does not neces-
sarily prove, indeed, that excess of labour, is the depo-
pulating cause. Their condition and treatment may be,
in other respects, bad and destructive ; but if the same ca-
lamity occurs only in the sugar colonies, where forced la-
bour is confessedly the most severe, and is there proportionate
to the degrees in which sugar is raised ; if there is no decline,
but on the contrary an increase in the slave population, under

* I refer, not for authority, but for detail and computation, to a statistical
table, extracted from those public returns in the Anti-slavery Monthly Re
porter, No. 26, for July, 1827, in order that any reader who doubts the accuracy
of this general result, or any opponent who denies it, may be enabled to
detect and expose any error in the arithmetic or official data. The waste
of life is evidently in a larger proportion, by all the amount of that in-
crease which should have been made by births, within the same period :
and estimating this only by the rate of increase in the slaves of the United
States, as stated from authentic public documents in the same paper, the
loss in six years may be said to be more that 18 per cent., or 3 per cent,
per annum, amounting in number to 145,331. See also the Anti-Slavery
Reporter, No. 27, p. 52.

f " Domestic negroes," says Dr. Collins, " who undergo no more
" drudgery than household duties require, and are supplied with com-
" petent food and clothing, are as healthy and prolific, and live as long
" as any other class of people in the West Indies." — Practical Rules,
p. 19.

78 Presumption of excessive Labour

the same, or more unfavourable circumstances, wherever that ar-
ticle is not cultivated, and labour consequently is less severe ;
and if, where there is no forced labour at all, the same race, in
the same climate, multiply with great rapidity,* surely we
must in sound reasoning ascribe the calamity to the one pe-
culiar cause.

Now, that such are the facts of the case has been often
asserted by the public opponents of slavery ; and never, to
my knowledge, denied by its apologists ; and has been de-
monstrated by evidence of the most authoritative kind. In
colonies where sugar is not cultivated, as, for instance, in the
Bahamas, the slaves are found to have a great native increase ;
the same, though in a less degree, is the case in the sugar
colonies themselves, on cotton estates ; and everywhere, to a
very considerable extent, among domestic slaves. In the
United States of America, the increase in the slave popu-
lation is from to 2 to 21 per cent, per annum, though slavery,
in point of law, and in practice too, the article of labour ex-
cepted, is not less severe than in our own sugar colonies ; and
though the climate is certainly much less favourable to African
constitutions.

It may be doubted, whether the native increase among the
slaves in that country, is less than among its free inhabitants ;
for the ratio of increase in the general population of the
United States appears, by a decennial census, to be very re-
gularly about three per cent, per annum, comprising all
classes,i- and if the increase of the free exceeds, by a half
per cent, or somewhat more, that of the slaves, the very large
influx of the former from foreign countres, together with ma-
numissions of the latter, may well account for the difference.

* The existence of all the phenomena here mentioned, are shewn from
official authorities in the Anti-Slavery Reporters last cited, and in No. 31,
p. 155.

f See statistical accounts quoted in the Quarterly Review for January,
1828, p. 264. I am sorry to say that I might cite this very eminent periodi-
cal work as evidence, were it necessary, without infringing my general rule.
See also the striking facts and observations in the Edinburgh Review for
June, 1829, p. 497, 8.

from the Decline of Population. 79

The observation tends strongly to shew the great natural
fecundity of the African race, when unsubdued by a pernicious
excess of labour ; for that the state of slavery is, even with-
out this destructive species of oppression, unfriendly to the
multiplication of our species, cannot admit of a doubt. I
have already noticed the case of Hayti, where forced labour
exists no more ; and where a mortality not less dreadful than
the greatest that ever prevailed in our own islands, existed
while it was a flourishing sugar colony. Such, there, has
been the rapid increase of the black population, that its
amount, by the best authenticated estimates, has been nearly
doubled, in less than thirty years.

But a contrast still more instructive and decisive, if possi-
ble, and to which I request special attention, may be found
in Trinidad ; and is attested by an official document trans-
mitted by the Council of that Island, through the Governor;
being an extract from the Council's Minutes, of the examin-
ations taken by them, for the purpose of supporting their
opposition to the progressive manumission of slaves, on the
ground of forced labour being necessary for the cultivation of
their estates. It may surprise most of my readers, perhaps,
that in this paper (printed by order of the House of Com-
mons of the 14th of June, 1827) we find the following facts ;

Between November 1815 and January 1821, at different
periods, 774 negroes were brought into that island, which
had been rescued from slavery, partly by the seizure of slave
ships, under the abolition acts ; but chiefly by running away
from their masters in the United States, and taking refuge on
board our ships of war, during our hostilities with that country ;
which they did on the British admiral's invitation, and under
his promise of protection and freedom.

The liberty given to them at Trinidad, was by no means
perfect. They were placed under the protection of an officer
appointed by government; a planter of the. island, and who
had been habituated to the practice of slavery on his own
estate during two-and-twenty years; and such were his powers
of restraint and discipline, that an uninformed reader might
be at a loss to distinguish their state clearly from that of the
slaves around them. In fact, its main distinction, but an all

80 Presumption of excessive Labour

important one, was that they were not driven, or forcibly com-
pelled to work, for the profit of a master, and at his discretion ;
but worked for their own benefit only ; though restrained
from idleness and vagrancy, by a discipline sufficiently strict.

What was the result ? — In the close of 1824, or by the
1st of February, 1825, native increase was found to have added
to their number 147 .— (See the parliamentary paper referred
to, p. 2 and 30). What was the sad reverse, during the same
period, and what is it still, with the slaves driven to their
work, in the same island ? A loss, as appears by the latest
official returns, of two and th7-ee quarters percent per annum!! !

In what way can our planters defend their system against
all these damning facts ? Their old plea was a disparity be-
tween the sexes ; but it was not true, generally speaking,
when alleged ; and it has since been proved by official returns,
that in the old colonies the female slaves have for many years
rather exceeded the males. Even in Trinidad, the inequality
is very small ; but among the free negroes there, whose pro-
gress in population I have contrasted with the shocking
decline among the slaves, the disproportion of sexes was
on the contrary extremely great ; and had been still greater.
There were, by the protector's statement, in December,
1824, no less than 350 men to 160 women; and till
1817 the case must have been still worse; for 63 'women
were then added; and there had been no subsequent ad-
dition of males, (same paper, p. 5 and 2). The result is,
from these circumstances, the more striking and decisive.
No possible experiment could more clearly demonstrate the
murderous effects of excessive forced labour on sugar estates,
or the falsehood of every plea that ascribes them to any other
cause than this ; with the concurrent oppressions to which that
abuse gives rise. The American refugees brought with them,
no doubt, to Trinidad, all the vices of slavery ; and the liberated
Africans, all those bad habits and propensities, which have
borne the blame of disease and death, and sterility in many
a West Indian apology ; but they were not driven ; and they
were not overworked.

I will here conclude these preliminary views ; and I desire,
after all, to take nothing by them in the judgment of my

from the Decline of Population. 81

readers, beyond the preparing their minds for a fair examinj^-
tion of the evidence, as to the actual, and very lamentable
case, which I shall now proceed to open. Whatever pre-
possessions they may have formed in favour of colonial pro-
prietors, from friendship, connection, or sjjecious private
representations, enough, I trust, has been said to prevent their
rejecting at the outset, as incredible, those revolting truths,
ivhich it is my painful duty to unfold.

VOL. n.

82 Of the Excess of forced Labour

CHAPTER IV.

THE ACTUAL ORDINARY DETAILS, AND GENERAL AMOUNT
IN POINT OF TIME OF FORCED LABOUR ON SUGAR PLAN-
TATIONS PARTICULARLY STATED AND PROVED; AND
ITS CRUEL EXCESS DEMONSTRATED.

Section I. — Introductory Remarks and Divisions of the Sub-
ject of this Chapter.

Labour may be excessive, either in point of duration or in-
tensity. It may occupy too large a portion of the labourer's
time ; leaving him intervals too short for reasonable refresh-
ment and repose ; or it may, in the degree of immediate
muscular exertion, be too arduous and severe. In both these
modes, the field negroes on sugar plantations are cruelly and
destructively overworked.

The degree of intensity of labour, is obviously not suscepti-
ble of such direct definition and proof as its duration ; because
we have no definite standard or scale whereby to measure
muscular exertion.

An actual beholder may perceive that a man is working
hard, or the reverse ; but has no means by which he can clearly
prove the fact to others ; still less any terms by which he can
define the positive degree of energy or languor. To convey
any accurate conception of it, he must resort to the effects
produced, in a given time ; and can apply that criterion only
when the subjects and modes of labour, and its ordinary pro-
duce, are such as we are familiar with. When these are all
unknown, and local circumstances also, affecting: the work-
man, arc foreign to our experience and observation, we cannot
easily form even a comparative estimate of the work, in point

in point of Time. 83

of easiness or intensity. An English farmer may judge from
the quantity of corn threshed out in a day, whether his
labourer has worked with more or less than ordinary exertion;
but what degree of effort has been requisite to produce
annually, by a gang of West India slaves, whose number is
given, a certain quantity of sugar, and whether the indivi-
duals who compose that gang have worked hard or otherwise
in given times during the different processes of the planta-
tion, are questions evidently beyond the reach of calculation,
upon any premises known to my European readers at large ;
though I hope to furnish them with some that may suffice
for a general and highly probable judgment.

But the same is not the case as to the diurnal, or other
periodical times, during tvhich the work is continued. Here we
have a measure of moderation or excess, positive, definite, and
clear; and applicable to every species of human labour, in
every climate, though not in an equal degree. The more
intense the exertion is, and the hotter the atmosphere, the
more fatiguing and exhausting a given duration of labour
obviously must be; and the latter distinction is, for reasons
assigned in the preceding chapters, of main importance. If
the maximum of the time which can be given to the labours
of the field in a temperate climate, without prejudice to life or
health, can be found, we may with certainty conclude, that in
the torrid zone, the same duration of them would amount to
great and pernicious excess.

I shall, therefore, in the first place, state and demonstrate
the actual portions of time during which the predial slaves
in the sugar colonies are compelled to work, diurnally and
weekly, at the different seasons of the year : next, shall
assist my readers with such information and suggestions as
may enable them, in some degree, though imperfectly, to
estimate the intensity of the labour ; and afterwards, compare
it with the ordinary amount of agricultural labour in En-
gland, and other countries.

c; 2

84 Of the Excess of forced Labour

Section II. — The Labour is cruellj/ excessive in point of Time.

Those who are not familiar with the controversies, of which
slave trade and slavery have been the subjects, and the ge-
neral character of those defences which the colonial party
have made successively for both, may suppose that the ac-
tual time of daily labour, cannot well have been a topic of
much dispute in point of fact ; more especially if the practice
in that respect is uniform and long established ; because it
may be thought a matter too conspicuous and notorious, to be
greatly misrepresented on either side, without certain detec-
tion and disgrace.

But unhappily, in this case, the controversy is on one side
of the Atlantic, and the facts are on the other. Still more un-
happily, the system in question is so highly disreputable and
offensive in European eyes, that violations of truth in its de-
fence, are held less disgraceful by those who are engaged in
it, than the admission of its real nature and details ; nor can
they hope, by any fair means, to avert reformations which
they deem subversive of their fortunes, by the interposition of
the British Legislature. They have not scrupled therefore to
publish, and solemnly to attest in this country, statements
grossly repugnant to truth, and to local notoriety ,• and when
such impostures have been refuted and exposed, even on the
evidence of their own partizans and their own records, they
have boldly reiterated the same refuted falsehoods ; and en-
deavoured to cry down as calumniators and liars, all who
have borne testimony to the truth.

If any man deems this censure too strong to be true, I refer
him to the general misrepresentations exposed in the last
chapter ; and might refer also to my former volume, for the
many extravagant mistatements of the slave-laws, which it
quotes and clearly refutes, by extracts from their own printed
codes, and by the testimony of some of their own witnesses ;
and to the many virulent libels by which those labours of mine
on the side of the truth have been repaid. Let it not then be
thought incredible or strange, that the planters and their
apologists, have stated the ordinary long established time of
slave labour per diem, as being less in an enormous proportion

in point of Time. 85

than its true amount; or that some of them have had the au-
dacity to advance that it does not exceed eight or nine hours
per diem ; whereas I shall prove it, from details furnished by
evidence on their own side, to be, in crop-time, eighteen hours
and more, and at least sixteen on an average through the year.

The best and fairest way of enabling my readers to under-
stand and apply the evidence on this branch of my subject,
will be to shew them, first, what was specifically alleged upon
it at the outset, by the early advocates of reformation ; and next
to examine the colonial testimony that was opposed to them ;
especially that which was given before the committees of the
privy council and the House of Commons, on the question of
abolishing the slave trade. The reader will thus be possessed
of the various points that were in issue between the parties,
on this important subject ; and be enabled to form a right
judgment between them as to its true amount at that period;
after which he will be better prepared to follow me in an ex-
amination of the most recent colonial evidence, in order to de-
termine whether there has since been any change on the side
of moderation or mercy.

I shall select, for the first purpose, the statements of the
Rev. Mr. Ramsay ; because his publication gave the first
practical view of slavery in the sugar colonies, that excited
the attention of the British public ; and formed the basis of
the long controversy on that subject which ensued. It was to
the refutation or support of his statements, that the respective
combatants chiefly bent their efforts. Without a previous know-
ledge of these, therefore, much of the evidence which I have
to cite would be imperfectly understood.

Let it not be supposed for a moment, that I am here re-
ceding from the engagement of verifying my delineation of
slavery by the testimony of its apologists alone. I do not
cite Mr. Ramsay as a witness, though he was a highly
respectable and competent one ; and was attached to the
colonies, by the nearest family connections ; for he was, like
myself, a foe to the system he described. I desire, therefore,
that his account may be considered as of no more authority
than the speech of a counsel, in opening the case of a pro-
secutor to the jury. But as it is often absolutely necessary,
when a general charge is to be made out in a court of law by

86 Of the Excess of forced Labour

the combined effect of many particular facts, that a connected
statement should precede the adduction of proofs ; so here,
the daily and nightly work of the slaves at different seasons,
being a subject of complexity and detail, it is necessary for
the reader's assistance, that he should be imformed at the out-
set, with some particularity, what the accusers allege and un-
dertake to prove. I might, it is true, attain in this respect,
the same object by a preliminary statement of my own ; but,
for the reason assigned, it is better to extract Mr. Ramsay's.

" The discipline of a sugar estate," said that writer, " is as
" exact as that of a reg-iment. At four o'clock in the morn-
" ing, the plantation bell rings to call the slaves into the
" field. Their work is to manure, dig and hoe-plow, the
** ground, to plant, weed, and cut the canes, and bring them
" to the mill, &c. About nine o'clock they have half an hour
" for breakfast, which they take in the field. — Again they
" fall to work ; and, according to the custom of the plantation,
" continue until eleven o'clock or noon. The bell then rings ;
" and the slaves are dispersed in the neighbourhood to pick
" up about the fences, in the mountains and fallows, or waste
" grounds, natural grass and weeds for the horses and cattle.
" The time allotted for this branch of work and preparation
" of dinner, varies from an hour and a half to near three
" hours. In collecting pile by pile their little bundles of
" grass, the slaves of lowland plantations frequently burnt
" up by the sun, must wander in their neighbour's grounds
" perhaps more than two miles from home."

After noticing some occasional hardships, to which the poor
slave is exposed by being punished as a trespasser, and having
his bundle of grass taken away from him, after its painful
collection, he adds, " At one, or in some plantations at two
" o'clock, the bell summonses them to deliver in the tale of
" their grass, and assemble to their field-work. If the owner
" thinks their bundles too small, or if they come too late
" with them, they are punished with a number of stripes from
" four to ten : some masters, under a fit of carefulness for
" their cattle, have gone as far as fifty stripes. About half
" an hour before sun-set, they may be found scattered again
" over the land, to cull again blade by blade from among the
" weeds, their scanty parcels of grass. About seven o'clock

in point of Time. 87

" in the evening, or later according to the season of the year,
" when the overseer can find leisure, they are called over by
" list to deliver in their second bundles of grass ; and the
" same punishment as at noon is inflicted on the delinquents.
" They then separate, to pick up, in their way to their huts,
" (if they have not done it, as they generally do, while gather-
" ing grass,) a little brushwood or cow-dung, to prepare some
" simple mess for supper and to-morrow's breakfast. This
" employs them till near midnight; and then they go to sleep
" till the bell calls them in the morning."*

*' The work here mentioned (continues Mr. Ramsay) is
" considered as the duty of slaves that may be insisted on,
" without reproach to the manager of unusual severity ; and
" which the white and black overseers stand over them to see
'' executed; the transgression of which is quickly followed with
" the smart of the cart-whip.f In crop-time, which (he ob-
" serves) may be reckoned together on a plantation from five to
" six months, the cane-tops, by supplying the cattle with food,
" give the slaves some little relaxation in picking grass ; but
" some planters, will, especially in moonlight, keep their
" slaves till ten o'clock at night, in carrying wowra (the de-
" cayed leaves of the cane) to boil oif the cane juice: a con-
" siderable number of slaves are kept to attend in turn the
" mill and boiling house all night."

" The process of sugar-making, is carried on in many
" plantations for months, without any other interruption than
" during some part of day-light on Sundays. In some plan-
" tations it is the custom to keep the whole gang employed
" as above, from morning to night, and alternately one half
" throughout the night, to supply the mill with canes, and the
" boiling-house with wowra. ;{:

He admits that there are mitigations of this treatment
among the more humane and liberal planters ; and adds :
" In some particular plantations they enjoy as much ease
" and indulgence, the grievance of picking grass, and the

* Essay on the Treatment and Conversion of African Slaves in the
British Colonies, by the Rev, James Ramsay, \'icar of Teston, Kent,
p. 69—72.

t Ibid. p. 74. + Ibid. p. 76.

88 Of the Excess of forced Labour

" circumstance of their being so long as sixteen hours out oj the
" twentt/-four under the lash of the drivers, excepted, as are
" compatible with tlieir present state of ignorance and
" dependance, and the accurate methodical cultivation of a
" sugar estate."*
These statements, with Mr, Ramsay's other revolting accounts

of negro slavery, were, by the colonial party, loudly and indig-
nantly denied. They exclaimed against its author, as a wilful
and malicious violator of truth ; and a gross calumniator of the
j)lanters, among whom he had lived respected and beloved,
about twenty years. They commenced against him the use
of those tactics, which they have since uniformly employed
against all the eye-witnesses of their system, who have dared
to give their public testimony to its abuses. Numerous de-
famatory libels were published against him, and widely cir-
culated, to impair his credit in this country ; and not without
effect; though, I believe, few men ever had a stronger shield
against them, among all to whom the pure and blameless
tenor of his private life was known. But as I claim no cre-
dence to his testimony, as such, it is not incumbent on me
here to defend his memory. It will be enough for me to prove
the truth of the statements I have quoted.f

* Ibid. p. 87.

f In undertaking to prove the truth of this account, I do not mean that
it is accurate in every particular ; or that it was so generally, in the sense
that Mr. ll.'s enemies ascribed to it; but only in his own. He meant
to describe the practice as he had known it in St. Christopher, or in that
island and Nevis alone ; as clearly appears from the work itself. In Jamaica,
and some other sugar-colonies, the subjects, modes, and times of labour,
are, and always have been, variant in some respects from those of the old
colonies, which then formed the Leeward-island government ; and I shall
fully notice those varieties hereafter. The reverend author also admitted,
as we have seen, that there was less severity of treatment on some planta-
tations in the same islands, than on others. He meant his account to be con-
sidered, therefore, as generally, not universally true.

But I would direct the attention of my readers to the last extract, which
I have printed in italics, as descriptive of the ordinary amount of daily
labour, even on those estates which he notices as favourable exceptions.
That this was not, and still is not, less than sixteen hours in the twenty-four
on an average, I trust clearly to establish in respect of the sugar-colonies at

in point of Time. 89

Such having been the facts alleged on the one side, let me
next shew to what extent they were denied on the other. In
the examinations, that soon after took place before the Com-
mittee of the Privy Council, appointed to enquire into facts
connected with the slave-trade, there was a standing inter-
rogatory relative to the hours of daily labour generally ex-
acted from, and the times of rest allowed to, the slaves, in
each of the sugar-colonies ; and many witnesses of the first
respectability among the planters, including the agents of
the different islands, were examined upon it. Among them,
the gentlemen connected with Jamaica, deserve, in respect
of the extent and importance of that colony, the first atten-
tion. They were, Mr. Fuller, the then agent, Mr. Long,
and Mr. Chisholme ; and their joint answer was, " The work-
" ing hours of the slaves, are eight, or not exceeding nine
" in the four and tiventy.'"*

This was no hasty or ill-considered answer of those re-
spectable witnesses; for their attention having been again
called to the subject by another standing interrogatory, which
enquired as to differences of the labour, at different seasons
of the year ; they said, " The work of the negro slaves in
" Jamaica, is far less than that of a labourer in Great Britain.
" They have in general fifteen hours in twenty-four to them-

large; and if this proposition is proved; it ought to be more than enough
for my purpose.

In saying that the slaves worked so long " under the lash of the drivers,^'
Mr. R. was unjustly charged with falsehood. His meaning manifestly is
not that the lash was so long actually inflicted, or that the drivers were all
the time behind them ; for he had described no small portion of it as em-
ployed while the slaves, scattered over the same or other estates, were
employed in their solitary individual task of grass-picking. His words
plainly were meant to convey no more than, that either the presence, or the
terror of the driver's whip, compelled the slaves to work so long. It is
in this sense, that I undertake to maintain his proposition ; and must so
far qualify it in respect of colonies, not in his contemplation, those in
which the slaves raise their own provisions — as to admit that the coercive
principle is not generally during that employment, the terror of the
drivers ; but in great measure the sense of hunger^ or the dread of approach-
ing want.

* Printed Report, part 3. title Jamaica, (J. A. No. 9.

90 Of the Excess of forced Labour

" selves ; which is quite sufficient for sleep, and for cooking
*' and eating their victuals, to say nothing of recreations."*

I request the reader's attention to the terms of this latter
answer ; because they preclude the resort to an explanation,
which I shall have occasion much to notice hereafter, — the
omitting in such statements, the time during which the slaves
are obliged to work in the culture of provisions, for their own
subsistence. No such explanation can here be allowed ;
since cooking and eating were alleged to be the only deduc-
tions from the fifteen hours left for sleep and recreation : nor
did these gentlemen say any thing as to the great increase of
labour in crop-time ; though the interrogatory expressly en-
quired, whether there was any increase of it in time of
harvest.

Here, then, we have a breadth of contradiction to Mr.
Ramsay, such as must astonish any man not familiar with
the ordinary character of colonial testimony on these subjects.
The difference in respect of this general fact, of the utmost
publicity in the colonies, is as eight or nine to sixteen ; or nearly
as two to one. If these witnesses spoke the truth, the re-
verend author they contradicted, a beneficed clergyman of
the Church of England, in venturing on so enormous an
exaggeration, in the face of a powerful party, with multitudes
on the spot to whom his exposure would be interest, honour,
and favour with all their fellow-colonists, must be supposed
to have made shipwreck, not only of his morals, but his
understanding. But before the reader adopts this conclusion,
let him in the next place attend to what other witnesses on
the colonial side, stated on the same subject, nearly at the
same time.

Almost all the other witnesses examined before the Privy
Council, in answering the same interrogatories, prudently
avoided defining the amount of labour or of respite, by the
number of hours per day. The only exception I have noted,
was Mr. Laing of Dominica, who says, " They (the slaves)
" are not on an average employed above ten hours in the
" twenty-four." t If he meant to include the crop-time,

* Printed Report, &c., Q. A. No. 36.

t Privy Council Report^ part 3. title Dominica, A. No. 9.

in point of Time. 91

this is a discordancy with the Jamaica witnesses, by no more
than one or two hours per day, (no small difference, certainly,
in respect of hard and constant labour, more especially between
the tropics) ; but it plainly appears, that he could not so mean ;
because in answering the other interrogatory, he states that in
the crop-season, which he says is from February to June, " The
" slaves employed in the mill and boiling house, are only
" relieved once in twenty-four hours,"* the effect of which
must very greatly, on his own premises, have enlarged that
average.

Other witnesses before the Privy Council, while avoid-
ing any such simple and intelligible statements ; entered into
details, of which I shall soon shew, that the effect was a
much larger difference than Mr. Laing's, with Messrs. Fuller,
Long, and Chisholme; and a much nearer agreement with
Mr. Ramsay.

But further examinations on the same subjects took place
in 1790 and 1791, before a Committee of the House of Com-
mons ; and one very eminent and long-experienced planter of
Jamaica, John Wedderburne, Esq. was interrogated specifi-
cally on the same point, the number of hours per diem. —
Q. " How many hours of the twenty-four do the negroes
" labour; the time of crop excepted?" Answer. " About eleven
" hours."-\

Is it supposed that this respectable gentleman spoke from
ignorance ? He says, in the same evidence, that he himself
*• had the charge of plantations containing full 5000 slaves."!
He was a witness called by the West India petitioners; and
certainly no enemy of the system. He spoke of the treatment
of the slaves as in general very humane ; and said "their
situation was a happy one."§ Yet we find that, without in-
cluding the crop-season, in which the time of labour is admit-
ted by every witness, and every writer that has noticed the
subject, to be very largely augmented by night-work, he
added no less than between two and three hours, i, e. from one-
fourth to one-third, to what his brother planters of the same

* Ibid. A. No. 3G.

t Commons Report on the Slave Trade 1790, p. 376.

X Ibid. 370. § Ibid. 378.

92 Of the Excess of forced Labour

island, and its public agent, had stated to the Privy Council
as the true amount of the time of daily labour. He admitted
eleven hours out of crop ; whereas they made, as 1 have ob-
served, no exception of the crop-time j but must have meant
to be understood to mean eight or nine hours on an average of
all seasons.

And what is the length of the crop time ? They themselves
stated it to be about five months.* We must therefore add
to the enormous difference between their account and Mr.
Wedderburne's, five- twelfths of the great, but yet undefined
increment of labour, during that portion of the year.

The colonial petitioners, in the same parliamentary examin-
ations, addressed a question to one of their witnesses, Alex-
ander Douglas, Esq. then an eminent West India merchant,
and with the evident view of contradicting Mr. Ramsay ;
probably because Mr. Douglas and he had long resided in the
same island, St. Christopher. The question was, " Do you

* conceive that, at any time or season of the year, the respite

* granted to negroes in the island of St. Christopher from
' their labour, amounts only to four or five hours out of the
' twenty-four?" The answer was, " I think they have from

* nine to eleven hours' respite." If so, from thirteen to fifteen
hours, would be the time of labour. It may be supposed,
perhaps, that this answer had reference to the crop-season j
because Mr. Ramsay had shewn that the slaves who then
work with relays through the night, added to their ordinary
day work, could not have more than four or five clear hours
for sleep. But the witness could not with consistency have
taken night-work into the account, because he had immedi-
ately before said he understood that practice to have been
abolished on most estates, f In that case, his estimate in a
general view might not have been far from the truth ; but
those who led the respectable witness so to understand, might
as truly have asserted that fires in the winter season were for
the most part laid aside in London ; as the reader will find,
when I cite the evidence on that part of the system. At all
events, his admission put those witnesses out of court who

* Privy Council Report, part 3, J^itle Jamaica, Q. A. No. 36.
t Commons Report of 1790, p. 289.

in point of Time. 93

alleged eight or nine hours to be the limitation, without any
exception of the crop-time.

The reader, I trust, already sees, that the evidence for the
defendants was hardly more inconsistent with the charge of
the accuser, than with itself. But let us proceed.

Doctor Collins, who wrote about ten years later than these
accounts, unfortunately omits to state expressly the ordinary
times of work. It is the most striking defect in his very
valuable publication ; and one of which I am at no loss to con-
jecture the reason ; but it may be clearly collected, that if he
had been explicit on this subject, tender though healways is in
touching abuses of a general kind, his statement would have
confirmed or gone beyond that of Mr. Wedderburne ; for in
advising the planters to repair the huts of their slaves, so as
to exclude the wind and rain, he urges the consideration that
they cannot find time to do that work for themselves, and says,
" With negroes, hal/^ whose time is devoted to the service of
" their masters, the little which is not given to sleep, must
" necessarily be employed in obtaining or cooking their food,
" which exhausts almost the whole of their short remissions
" from labour."* A strange contrast this, by the way, to the
representations of the Jamaica gentlemen, and many others
that I shall hereafter have to state, which describe these poor
beings as having fifteen hours in the twenty-four for rest and
recreation ; and as having a superfluity of leisure to gain wealth
for themselves.

It may be thought, perhaps, that the expression half their
time in this passage, is used in a loose, general way ; and was
not meant to convey the idea that they work so much as
twelve hours in twenty-four for the master ; but in another
place, when recommending the substitution of task work for
driving, the same intelligent colonist says, ** the work of
tivelve hours will be dispatched in ten.-\ I infer, therefore, that
he meant to be understood as estimating the ordinary work
out of crop at twelve hours ; and if so, his account will fall
little short of Mr. Ramsay's ; for let it be observed that he
assigns the " obtaining their food" as a charge upon the re-

* Medical Rules, &c., p. 13.5. f Ibid. 177.

94 Of the Excess of forced Labour

maining twelve hours of their time ; and their subsistence in
St. Vincent, where he resided, as in Jamaica, was in great
measure derived from the cultivation of their provision
grounds, which, like most other colonial writers, he does not
seem to regard strictly as work for the master. It appears,
also, clearly, from what he elsewhere says of night work in
crop-time, that he did not take that important addition into
account in his general estimate of their daily labour.

But let us return to the Privy Council evidence for further
demonstration on this subject ; for though the witnesses I
have cited were the only ones that thought fit to state ex-
pressly the amount of labour by the number of hours per
diem, premises were furnished by others from which they
may, with proper explanations, be computed.

While the committee of Privy Council was prosecuting
its enquiries, the legislatures of Jamaica and of some other
colonies, were preparing to parry the efforts of the aboli-
tionists, by passing some specious, though impotent laws for
the protection of their slaves ; and before the committee had
finished its labours, the first of those ostensible improvements,
the consolidation act of Jamaica of 1788, arrived, in time to
give the colonial party the benefit of it in the report. Mean-
time the standing interrogatories of the committee had been
officially transmitted to the governors of the different colo-
nies, with instructions to lay them before the councils and
assemblies, and obtain answers to them from those bodies;
in consequence of which answers were obtained from some of
them, and transmitted soon enough to be inserted in the same
report. That of the council of Jamaica to Q. A. No. 9. im-
mediately follows the above cited answer of Messrs. Fuller,
Chisholme, and Long; and is in these words, " This is an-
" swered by the consolidation act ; to the directions whereof the
" practice usually conforms*

Whether the latter proposition was true, my readers will be
soon enabled to judge; but they will not hesitate to believe
that if not so, the misrepresentation at least was not on the
unfavourable side. Considering the manifest object of the

Privy Council Report, part 3, title Jamaica, Q. A. No. 0.

in point of Time. 95

legislators, and of their agent and pavtizans in this country, by
whose solicitations the Act was passed, and who immediately
made abundant use of it before Parliament and the British
public, it is impossible to suppose that its ostensible regula-
tions were calculated to discredit the general existing prac-
tice of slavery, by holding out limitations of labour less
humane than those which practice had already established.

The singular style of the clause thus referred to, might suf-
fice to mark the true object of its authors ; for it is perhaps
the first law that ever embodied in its own enactments an
averment, implying that they were not wanted. The clause
was in the following words : " Be it enacted, that every field
" slave on such plantation or settlement shall on work days be
" allowed, according to custom, half an hour for breakfast, and
" two hours for dinner ; and that no slave shall be compelled
" to any manner of y?*e/J work upon the plantations before the
" hour of Jive in the morning, or after the hour of seven at
" night, except during the time of crop, under the penalty of
" ten pounds," &.c. *

We have an express admission here, then, from the highest
authority on the colonial side, that the customary practice
was not better than these limitations prescribe. Let us next
consider, therefore, to what they amount. It is the more im-
portant, to do so, because the same are identically the regu-
lations of labour by law in Jamaica, and every other sugar
colony where assemblies have passed any Acts on the subject
at the present hour : and I shall prove that the practice
now, as in 1788, though it does not conform to these re-
gulations, departs from them only on the oppressive or exact-
ing side.

From five in the morning till seven in the evening, being
fourteen hours, and the breakfast and dinner respite (if we
suppose them, for the present, to be bonajide intervals of rest)

* Consolidation Slave Act of December 6, 1788, sect. 18, printed in an
appendix to the same report of the Privy Council, part 3. See also the
Consolidation Act of 1792, printed by Mr. Edwards in his 2nd volume,
where the clause was re-enacted in the same words ; and the same was the
case in the Act of December, 1816, sect. 20. still in force, except that the
words "according to custom" are omitted.

96 Of the Excess of forced Labour

amounting together only to two hours and a half, there re-
mains, as the amount of daily labour in the cane pieces, or
" field work" out of crop-time, eleven hours and a half

Let me pause here again for a moment, to compare this
result with the statement of the colonial agent and eminent
proprietors resident here, who were examined by the same
committee. Take eight hours and a half as the medium be-
tween their terms, and we have a subduction of no less than
three hours from the actual amount. We must add near
three-eighths to the quantum alleged by them, in order to
make it agree with the cotemporary admission of the legisla-
tive council of their island, and of the Act to which they
refer.

But this is by no means all ; since those witnesses, be it
remembered, spoke, without any exception of the crop-time,
the large augmentation of labour in which continues about
five months in the year. *

We have it thus established beyond all dispute, that even
at the season of the shortest diurnal labours, they occupy
at least eleven hours and a half of the twenty-four; but to
reduce them to this amount, it must be supposed that the
interval of half an hour in the morning and two hours at
noon, are really and entirely periods of rest, or exemptions
from every species of laborious occupation ; which is not, and
cannot possibly be the truth. If they were so, what time
would be left for the slaves to work in, or even visit, their
own provision grounds, when near enough for access on work-
ing days ?

We are told that Saturday afternoon once a fortnight, or

* Should the reader be disposed to give the Jamaica council some credit
for candour in thus discrediting their own agent, and the other witnesses
that had been brought forward by their partizans in this country ; let him
observe that the Cor^solidation Act may be presumed from its date, De-
cember, 1 788, to have been laid before the governor for his assent, and
officially transmitted by him, though not yet received in this country,
before the testimony that I have cited from the Privy Council Report
could be known in Jamaica. There was probably a like priority in the
answer of the council, which is not dated ; but if not, the statement of
the usage so strangely introduced into the enactments themselves, had
stopped them from alleging that the practice differed from the law.

in point of Time. 97

by some planters, every week, is allowed for the purpose of
cultivating those grounds out of the crop-season. Let this
be supposed to be generally true ; and that with the aid of
Sabbath work, which is confessedly applied to that purpose,
the time is made to suffice : still the provisions must be ga-
thered, as well as raised, and brought from the grounds,
which are generally far distant from the negro huts and
homestall, and not less so from the cane-pieces where these
brief respites begin and end. Besides, the raw provisions
must be boiled, roasted, or otherwise prepared for eating.

The poor slave, be it always remembered, has no wife at
home to prepare his meals for him ; for she, if he has one, is
worked in the field with himself, till the general dismission
of the gang. If we should suppose materials for the meal
already at their hut, still they must gb there to dress it ;
and to go and return, a mile or two- under a vertical sun,
mounting, perhaps, steep acclivities, as is very usual, in the
way, is a bad mode of recruiting their strength after six or
seven hours of arduous labour, previous to its renewal for
four or five more on the same day. During the half hour al-
lowed for breakfast, such means of providing for their own
necessities are manifestly impracticable.

How then, the reader may be curious to learn, do these
poor drudges manage as to their meals ? In satisfying his
curiosity, I shall, perhaps, stagger his belief. The breakfast
is often, and the dinner most commonly, a meal only in name.
The former may often be lost, though there should be no
deficiency of food, from want of time to prepare it. In Ja-
maica, indeed, the practice is said generally to be, to allow
one negro or more to act as cooks in the field, for those who
bring with them raw materials for breakfast ; but I believe
that in most, or all other colonies, there is no such usage ;
and that unless the slave brings to the field food ready pre-
pared for eating, he must fast, from the want of means to
prepare it there, and of time to return for the purpose.

During the noontide respite, the more feeble sla\es gene-
rally lie down, to recruit from their fatigue ; and the more
able, commonly go to work on their provision grounds or gar-
dens, unless when they are too remote for the purpose.

VOL. II. H

98 Of the Excess of forced Labour

However startling these accounts may be, with those who
have had faith enough in their colonial friends, to credit the
strange fables industriously circulated amongst us, as to the
ease and luxury that the slaves enjoy, I trust the following-
extracts will be found sufficient to support my statements.

That the field negroes, commonly, return dinnerless to their
work after the noontide pause, is a fact respecting which,
however extraordinary, there is very little discordance among
the West India witnesses or writers ; to prove which, I will
cite three or four of them, who spoke or wrote at different
periods, from the beginning of the abolition controversy down
to the present time.

" They continue upon the hoe," said Mr. Beckford, " till
" dinnertime; that is, until twelve or one o'clock, and perhaps
" the medium of these hours is the general time of vacancy
" all over the Island (Jamaica). Although this be called the
" time of refection, and is with the overseer and the white
" people upon the plantation, that part of the day which is
*' set apart for this particular purpose, yet in this interval, the
" negroes seldom make a meal ; but are rather inclined to in-
" duloe their leisure in conversation with their fellows, or to
" loiter away the time in useless inactivity until the shell pre-
" pares them for a renovation of toil. They are allowed," he
adds, '* for a nominal dinner one hour and a half, but it gene-
" rally exceeds two before they all re-assemble."*

" It may be proper to observe," deposed Mr. Tohin of Nevis,
" that the two hours at noon is seldom employed by a negro
" in preparing a regular meal, their chief meal being at sup-
" per, so that they are frequently to be found working in
" their grounds during that interval."t

" They are allowed," deposed Mr. Willock of Antigua, " an
" hour and a half' for dinner time, and frequently take
*' an opportunity during that interval to work in their
" grounds."^

On this point, even Mr. Bryan Edwards did not wholly

* Remarks upon the situation of Negroes in Jamaica, by Mr. W. Beck-
ford, Jun., p. 44, 45.

t Commons Report of 1790, p. 276. \ Ibid. 347.

m point of Time, 99

suppress the truth, which his predecessors had admitted ;
though he qualified it with his usual address. " They are
** now allowed two hours of rest and refreshment, one of
'* which is commonly spent in sleep. Many of them, pre-
'* f erring a plentiful svpper to a meal at noon, pass the hours
*' of recess in sleep, or in collecting food for their pigs and
" poultry, of which they are permitted to keep as many as
*' they please : or perhaps a few of the more industrious will
'' employ an hour in their provision grounds.

English labourers also, are permitted to drink as much
wine as they please, provided they can get it ; imd it would
be about as fair to insinuate on that account that they spend
their spare time in bottling their Port or Madeira, as of the
common mass of field negroes, that they employ their noon
respite in collecting food for their pigs and poultry. But
under these artful glosses, the impressive fact peeps out, that
whether to reserve food enough for the evening, or to pro-
vide it for the future, or from whatever motive, the dinner
is foregone,

" At half-past twelve," writes Mr. De La Beche, in 1824,
" a conch shell is sounded, for all the negroes on the property
" to take their dinner ; b^it as dinner is a meal seldom taken by
*' the negroes, who from choice defer their principal repast till
*' the evening, the more industrious part of them generally de-
" vote the two hours alloived them by lata at this time, to the cul~
" tivation of their provision grounds^ a large proportion of
*' which is in this estate (his own) within five minutes' walk
'' from their houses." f

* Hist, of West Indies, vol. ii. p. 134.

f Notes, Sec, p. 3. The respectable author seems here to have for-
gotten that it is not from their houses, that die negroes are to come at noon, but
from the cane-piece, however distant, that they were at work upon ; and to
which they must return within the two hours allowed.

It would be unjust, however, to tliis gentleman, not to add that he writes
with a degree of candour which distinguishes him very honourably from
the other West India planters who have givfin information on ihese sub-
jects to the British public. It is not without hesitation that I add to
these authorities an extract from the work called Barclay s. The ultra
contempt of truth and fair dealing, manifest in every page of it, makes the
citation of it, even against its compilers, painful and disgusting: but it

H 2

100 Of the Excess ofjorced Labour

When these accounts are taken together, it will be seen
what the case really was and is. The poor people, rarely, if
ever, dine; but during the two hours in which the superin-
tendants retire for their dinners, the slaves are released from
the drivers, and left to spend the time either in rest, or in
working individually on their provision grounds. The former
is naturally the choice of those slaves who, being the weakest
in body, are the most completely fatigued and exhausted by
six or seven previous hours of vigorous exertion ; but the more
" industrious^" by which we may generally understand in co-
lonial language the stronger slaves, avail themselves of this
opportunity to work in their grounds, when near enough, or
bring provisions from them ; thereby perhaps obtaining for
themselves relaxations on the Sabbath, which they otherwise
could not enjoy ; and sometimes to collect firewood for their
own use in the evening, or bundles of the same article, or of
grass for sale in the market, if they are fortunate enough to
be near a town.

It is a cruel abuse of terms to say, even of those who re-
main inactive, from weary nature's irresistible demand for a
short respite, between two long periods of forced labour, that
they have so much time for themselves. But to those who are
less exhausted, the respite at noon, miscalled dinner time,
gives, we see, neither food nor rest, but a change of labour
only ; though it is, I admit, a change much for the better,
because the drivers are no longer behind them.

brings down the West India case to a more recent period by two years,
that Mr. De la Beche's work, and I find this passage in it (p. 319), in re-
spect of the noon-tide respite. — " They employ the time at their own con-
" cerns — mending their fences or hogsties, canying home fire-wood, cane-
" tops, or hog-meat, &c. A feiv roasted plcmtains, with a little fish, is all
" thei/ seem to care about eating in the middle of the dui/,hveak{d.st and supper
" being their chief meals."

Where, when, and how, do they procure and dress the fish and roast the
plantains ? Why was it not said that they resort to taverns for a lunch of
turtle, and some glasses of madeira ? Certainly not because it is not
equally true Tliis chef d' aunrc of the party quite beggars the invention of
Mr. Edwards, and the rest who have endeavoured to varnish over the
want of a dinner, and the labours that employ the miscalled dinner-time.
Yet the opprobrious facts appear.

in point of Time. 1 0 1

When we arc gravely told that such toilsome employment
of an interval placed between six hours and a half of previous,
and five hours of subsequent driving, under the solar blaze,
is matter of choice, laughter may be suppressed by pity and
indignation ; but a serious answer surely cannot be called for.
If any man has faith to believe it, he must deem the poor
negroes industrious to a fault, and to a wonder ; and must be
astonished therefore at the charges of Major Moodij and others,
who tell us that the love of ease, of repose, and refreshment in
the shade, is so strong in them, as to prompt them to a vicious
excess in its indulgence, and to be wholly indomitable except
by the driving-whip.

But the slave-masters are here only at their ordinary prac-
tices on English credulity. It is a standing rule with them,
to extenuate every oppression which they can neither deny,
nor as their own act defend, by the choice of the poor
slaves themselves. Are they compelled, for instance, to watch
and work at night during the crop ? we are told they like it ;
and prefer the crop-season to all others. Are they denied a
Sabbath rest? it is because they love the Sunday markets,
and would be discontented with their abolition. Is marriage
discouraged, and its rights set at nought ? it is because they
love polygamy or loose amours. The impious neglect of all
religious instruction, was long excused by the same plea : the
negroes were said to be invincibly attached to their African su-
perstitions ; yet when the indignant voice of the British people
called forth the Jamaica Curates' Bill, they rushed, we hear, in
multitudes to the Christian font. Nay, the tearing them from
their native homes and their dearest connections, and trans-
porting them to a distant colony for life, till an act of Parlia-
ment put a stop to it, was also their singular choice. Even
after that prohibition, masters and mistresses have had the face
to solicit particular exceptions to it from Government and Par-
liament, on the same preposterous suggestion ; and I lament
to say not always without success. While the shores of some
of our islands rang with the heart-piercing lamentations of
wives and husbands, parents and children, severed to meet no
more, and resistance, by the desertion of many of the devoted
exiles, was su|)pressed only by military force, the British

1-02 Of the E-xcess of forced Labour

public and Legislature were actually led to believe that the
wishes of the banished slaves seconded the relentless cupidity
of their masters !

These strange self-inimical propensities, certainly, in the
point before us, as in all the rest, fall in admirably with the
master's convenience and interest. His drivers and overseers
are relieved from a wearisome superintendance during the ex-
cessive heat from twelve to two, and have time to return
from the field to their dinner ; while the slaves, if not too
much exhausted, are performing work for the supply of their
own urgent necessities, in ease of the master's purse.

The employment of the half hour in the morning, for break-
fast, is more variously represented ; I mean as to the actuality
of the meal, or the want of it ; and I believe it really va-
ries much in different colonies, and also on different plan-
tations. I will give a few extracts from the colonial writers
and witnesses on this subject also ; leaving the reader to form
his own conclusions from them, whether the breakfast is the
most commonly, nominal, or real.

Let us first hear the comprehensive and very authoritative
testimony of Dt. Colhns. " At breakfast it is customary to
" indulge the gang with half an hour, which is rather taken as
" an intermissioti of labour, than for a meal; as negroes seldom
'* appl^ it to that purpose; yet it is too salutary a practice to
*• be discontinued ; for it is a loss of time that will be easily re-
" paired by their invigorated efforts. Those who have in-
" fants," he adds, " should be allowed an hour to repair to
" the nursery to give them the breast." *

Dr. Collins, be it observed, speaks in, general of all the
sugar colonies ; and his humane suggestions are addressed to
the proprietors of them all. That he sincerely aimed at im-
provements cannot be doubted ; yet all, we see, that he ven-
tures to recommend, is continuing the suspension of labour,
not supplying the meal ; and he recommends the improve-
ment solely on an econ'omical ground ; admitting it to be, in a
view to the meal itself, a mere loss of time.

His advice as to mothers who have suckling infants, may

* Practical Rules, p. 188-9.

in point of Time. 103

require an explanatory comment. That their labour in the
field may not be lost or interrupted, such infants are consigned,
in the gross, to the care of a plantation dry-nurse at the negro
huts or honiestall, in a receptacle which he here dignifies by
the name of a nursery ; and we see that he regards an hour's
interval as necessary to enable the poor infants to receive the
breakfast which Nature has prepared for them in the break-
fastless mother. No more can be necessary to shew that the
adult slaves cannot possibly have time to return and prepare
it for themselves.

Mr. ToBiN, who was certainly one of the most liberal of
planters, assuming his statements of his own practice to be
impartial, but a violent public antagonist of Mr. Ramsay,
said, " Upon many estates, and upon all of which I had the
" direction, they had out of crop time a regular breakfast, of a
" biscuit and a proportion of molasses and water, which in
*' wet and rainy weather was qualified with rum."* This wit-
ness spoke of the island of Nevis.

Mr. Thomas, speaking of Nevis also, said, " About nine
" they broke up for the purpose of breakfasting, which was
** generally taken in the field, in preference of going to and
" from their houses" (a very necessary preference, certainly),
and for this purpose, he added, " everi/ good-i)tclined negro
*' generally carried his breakfast with him."f Unfortunately
he did not state what the proportion of these " good inclined
'' negroes" was ; and what was the lot of the rest. Had the
practice been general at Nevis, Mr. Tobin would hardly have
spoken as he did.

Mr. WiLLocK, of Antigua, a master of distinguished libe-
rality, mentioned a peculiarity of practice on his estate ; that
of his having generally fed about one-third of his ic hole gang
on what is called " the pot ;" i. e. food prepared and dressed
for them by the master ; and gave the following reason for it.
" My reason for feeding so many out of the pot, was a direc-
" tion given to the overseers, that when the negroes went to
" their breakfast in the field, if any negro did not bring some-
*' thing to eat, I immediately took away his allowance, and
" fed him from the pot. Though the quantity of provisions,"

* Commons Report of 1790, p. 297. f Ibid. 354.

104 Of the Excess of forced Labour

he added, " they got from being fed from the pot, was much
" more, yet it was a disgrace to them, and they dishked it ex-
" ceedingly, as they conceived themselves treated like new
" negroes.* One-third of his negroes, therefore, were kept
from being breakfastless only by this humane but extraordinary
expedient.

I do not wish my readers to infer from these authorities,
strong and various though they are, that the field negroes
always, or very generally, work fasting through the day, and
that their supper after their dismission from the labours of the
field is their only meal. Their oppression, in respect of food,
will be a separate subject of discussion in a subsequent
chapter; and it well then, I doubt not, appear to the convic-
tion of my readers, that in many, or most of the colonies, if
they eat more than once in the twenty-four hours, it must be
very sparingly indeed ; at least, where they wholly or chiefly
depend on the master's weekly allowances for support. I
have cited these colonial testimonies here, only lest un-
informed readers should doubt the possibility of the meal-
time respites being diverted from their nominal use, and being
periods of actual labour, well attested though we have
seen the fact to be, by the apologists of the system. I feel
myself warranted by so many concurrent and unexceptionable
authorities, to affirm, what I believe the fact to be, that though
the practice as to breakfasts varies in different colonies, and
on different estates in the same colony, the dinner is, gene-
rally speaking, everywhere dispensed with; but whether from
choice or necessity, my readers will be better enabled to judge,
when informed of the ordinal y practice as to the supply
and preparation of food. Meantime let us return to that im-
portant topic, the hours of daily labour.

Hitherto I have proceeded on the supposition that the la-
bours of the slaves out of crop-time may, in a proper and
strict sense, be said to begin at five in the morning, and end
at seven in the evening, according to the alleged effect of the
limitations in the colonial meliorating acts, to which, as we
are assured by the legislators who made them, and by the

Commons Report of 1790, p. 247.

in point of Time. 105

recitals and averments of the acts themselves, the practice
conforms.

But what, by the express purview of these laws, is the
work to which the limitations apply ? It is only actual la-
bour in the field : in other words, that work which the col-
lected gang performs under the drivers, from the morning
muster to the evening dismissal, which is limited, as we have
seen, to fourteen hours, with intervals of two hours and a
half. They are not sooner or later to be " compelled to any
" manner of field-work, except in the crop-season."

Are the remaining ten hours and a half of the twenty-four,
then, noon-work excepted, times of rest or repose ? Clearly
not; for before the morning- work can begin, the negroes
must be roused from their sleep, and " turned out," as
it is called, from their huts ; and every individual must
proceed to, and assemble at the spot, however distant, of ap-
pointed work. Many, no doubt, to avoid the peril of tardiness,
arrive before the rest; for there the driver stands with his
whip, to inflict instant flagellation on those who come too late ;
and if the gang is to be put in line at five o'clock, the bell,
or conch-shell, or far-resounding whip, variously used to
awaken the slaves, must give their awful summons long
before. The cane-piece where they are to be worked for
the day, may be at a great distance from the huts; sometimes
on large estates from one to two miles ; and very commonly
they have a steep hill to ascend ; for most estates, at least in
the smaller islands, range from the sea side or low grounds, to
a considerable height on the side of a high hill or mountain ;
and the cluster of houses called the negro-houses, is commonly
placed in the lower situations, near the manager's house and
the works. On the whole, I think it a probable calculation,
that an hour, or nearly that time, must intervene on an average
between the rousing the negroes from their sleep, and their
setting; to work in the field.

Nor is this all ; for so assiduous are the planters that the
work should begin as soon as there is light enough for the
purpose, that the bell or other call is always sounded at the
earliest peep of dawn ; nay often still sooner, as may suffi-
ciently appear by the following extract from Dr. Collins.

" In turning out in the morning," says that long-cxpc-

10(3 Of the Excess of forced Labour

rienced planter, " it is usual to prepare your negroes by the
" morning- bell, which by the carelessness of the watchman,
" or by the difficulty of distinguishing between the light of
" the moon, and the first approach of morning, is rung an
" hour or two earlier than it ought to be. This you should
" prevent, by directing it not to be rung, until the twilight is
" very well ascertained."*

* Practical Rules, p. 88.

Two very recent authorities may suffice to shew that the negroes are
still called out before day-break. The first is a work called Marly,
cr a Phnifer's Life in Jamaica, a new publication on the colonial side,
in the catching form of a novel. Should my right to quote him as
an antagonist be doubted, I refer to his sixteenth chapter, in which the
novellist drops his mask, and appears in his true character, as a serious
and zealous apologist of slavery, and champion of the colonial cause.
From his grapliic delineations of scenery and manners, no man who has
seen the West Indies will doubt of his having been resident there.

When describing his hero's initiation in the duties of a plantation book-
keeper, he says : —

" Next morning Marly was awakened out of a dream of delight, &c.,
" by the firing of the driver s whip ;" — " he started from his bed, but day had
" not yet glimmered from the East." (p. 62.) Again — " Next morning,
" before day broke, the firing, or smacking, of the driver s whip awakened
" Marly, when he started from his pillow," &c. (p. 49.)

The other recently published authority to which I refer, is no novel ;
but that grave defence of slavery by Mr. Commissioner Dwarris, which I
have before cited, in a letter to the Right Honourable Henry Gonlbiirn,
Chancellor of the Exchequer. " It is said," observes Mr. Dwarris, " that
" the slaves begin their toil before day ; and the assertion is true ; but in
" such a climate, it is no hardship to begin their work in the cool of the
" morning. It ought," he adds, " in common candour, at the same time,
" to have been stated, that in the countries of which we are now speaking,
" all classes rise at gunfire ; i. e. at five o'clock in the morning." (p. 17.)

A modest appeal to candour this, no doubt ! The whites certainly do,
in general, rise very early, especially if careful of their health ; but it is to
enjoy the cool air, and to take exercise before the sun rises ; not to increase
the length of daily toil. As to the field-negroes, they are so far from being
called out before day, for health or comfort, that Dr. Collins, and all
other authorities on the subject, notice their great sensibility to sufferings
from cold, and regard the chilling effects of their being turned out long
before sun-rise, as one great source of their diseases. If this candid writer
thinks it humane to work negroes in the earliest dawn because it is cold,
his abhorrence of the intolerable long-continued toils they arc afterwards

in punii of Time. 107

Another extract from Mr. De La Beche, will shew that the
poor weary, and drowsy slave, is likely not to demur at the
rousing call, however premature ; but to spring from his pallet
at the first sound of the plantation bell or whip, and make all
haste to the field.

" It is much to be regretted," he says, " that considerable
" martinetism exists on some properties, with regard to the
" time when the negroes ought to assemble in the morning.
" Then it is that the negroes sufter most from the driver's
" whip ; for he unfortunately can on his own authority in-
" flict punishment on those who are not in time.'"*

Not a few of the colonial witnesses and writers have at-
tempted to subtract an hoixr at least from the morning's
field-work, by representing its commencement to be at six
o'clock, instead of five ; but in a way inconsistent not only
with what I have shown to be the actual practice, but with
astronomical and geographical truth.

" About six o'clock in the morning," said one of them,
" which is generally about day-light, the whole gang are ex-
" pected to appear in the field ; the list was then called over,
" and absentees were marked down."f

*' With respect to the hours," said another, " the negroes are
" generally called into the field by the ringing of a bell about
" daicn of day, which, in a latitude where the days and nights
" are so nearly equal, is generally about six o'clock. "J

On the same physical premises it was of course added, that
day-light ended at six, and that the slaves remained no later
in the field ; and some of the colonial writers I think arraigned
the abolitionists of having asserted, what the laws of nature
made impos.!;ible, when they stated the true daily commence-
ment and termination of the field-work.

It may naturally be supposed that the first Jamaica Conso-

subjected to in that broiling climate through the day, ought surely to exceed
my own. But I quote him only for the fact. As it is true that " the
" slaves still begin their toil before dat/Iighf," they must of course be still roused
and turned out before the first peep of dawn.

* Notes on the present Condition of the Slaves in Jamaica, p. 19.

t Commons Report of 1790, p. 247 ; Evidence of Mr. Thomas of Nevis.

I Ibid. p. 266 ; Evidence of Mr. Tobin.

108 Of the Excess of forced Labour

lidation Act disposed for ever of this part of the controversy.
In making five and seven the morning and evening limits of
field-work out of crop-time, i. e. in a season comprising the
shortest days, and stating that this was conformable to gene-
ral custom, it should have put an end both to the astronomi-
cal and practical question.

But the champions of slavery are far too stout to quail
under such knock-down blows, whether given by their foes
or fellow-combatants; and they now again with all their pris-
tine intrepidity attempt to cut off two hours from the day, in
order to reduce by the same amount the actual labour of the
slaves. The courageous Mr. M'Queen assures us, in what he
calls " a plain and undeniable statement, that the days and
*' nights in our West India islands are so nearly equal, that
" the difference is not worth taking into account, and may
" be taken at tivehe hours each;''* from which and other pre-
mises, equally undeniable, he concludes, and expressly asserts,
that " no negro out of crop xvorks above nine hours."

Though this writer is so strongly accredited to us by all the
colonies, that his voice may be fairly considered as theirs, I
might probably leave him here to settle the small difference
of two hours and a half between himself and his munificent
patrons, the legislators of Jamaica, if this revival of ex-
ploded fictions stood on his authority alone. But the Coun-
cil of Barbadoes, in a nearly cotemporary Report, has stated,
that " the slaves do not work more than nine hours for the day
*' at that season of the year when the days are short, and nine
*' hours and a half when the days are long ;" from which re-
ference to the length of days, and the near correspondence
with Mr. M'Queen's conclusion, it may be fairly presumed,
that his '' undeniable" premises were in view, and tacitly as-
sumed by that honourable Board.f

The Assembly of Jamaica, also, in the latest report it has
favoured us with on this subject of slave labour, has reduced
its amount out of crop, not indeed to nine hours, but to ten,
notwithstanding the evidence of its renewed and still subsist-
iiior law.

* West India Colonies, p. 257.

t Printed Report of the Council of Barbadoes, 1824, p. 108.

in point of Time, 109

" Although by the consolidated slave law, the master may
" call for fourteen hours' labour in the field, deducting one
" half hour for breakfast, and two hours for dinner, leaving
" of course eleven hours and a half for work ; yet in practice,
" the time for labour in summer is one hour, and in winter
" two hours, less than might be exacted by law ; so that the
" labourer only works on an average ten hours daily, and has
" fourteen for meals, relaxation, and rest.'"*

How remote from truth the last clause is, my readers have
been already enabled to judge : but my business at present is
with the field-work under the drivers, the only subject of
limitation ; and though the report itself, in reducing the prac-
tice to ten hours, does not expressly say that it begins and
ends with the daylight, the examinations annexed, and re-
ferred to, shew clearly that such an impression was meant to
be conveyed ; and also that the calculation was founded on
astronomical data grossly erroneous, though less so than those
of Mr. M' Queen. See an important extract from those exa-
minations given in a former chapter (p. 36-7,) the first pa-
ragraph of which it will be convenient to place again here
under the eye of the reader.

*' As to the hours of labour, when the examinant came to
" the island, the slaves were turned out full one hour before
" day, and kept out as long after dark. Their breakfast was
'' always cooked for them, and they were allowed half an
" hour to eat it, and two hours to go home to their dinner.
" As the length of the days on an average through the year in
" this climate, including twilight, is about ticelve hours and a
" half, so the slave then worked twelve hours in the twenty-
" four. At present, the same time is allowed for breakfast and
" dinner, but the slaves, as far as examinant sees, are only
" required to work in the field in daylight, and consequently,
*' they work only ten hours in the twenty-four."

I will not suppose the respectable witness to have meant
any thing unfair, either by the qualification, '' as far as exanii-
" nant sees," or by his changes of phraseology in the two sub-
jects of comparison, from " fumed out, and kept out,"' to

Printed Papers of 181G, already cited,) p. 25.

110 Of the Excess of forced Labour

" worked, and required to work in the f eld," or from *' length
'' of the daj/s," to " daylight." They must have been used
respectively in the same sense, or the comparison would be
plainly idle, and the effect wholly deceptions.

But what he, and the Committee in adopting his calcula-
tions, must be understood to mean, is this, that the " length
*' of the day, or daylight, including the twilight," is on an
average only twelve hours and a half; which deducting the
allowance of two hours and a half for meal-times, leaves ten
clear hours of field-woi'k ; and that the former excess arose
from the working an hour before the morning, and an hour
after the evenino;, twilio-ht.

The fallacy here lies in the alleged duration of the twilight,
which the witness rightly and expressly included in the day-
light or length of days ; whereas the other authorities I have
cited allow for it nothing at all ; but strangely shorten the day
to the time that the sun is above the horizon, and treat all the
rest as ni2.ht.

Now, though it is true, that the twilight in the West Indies
is much shorter at all seasons than here, to say that it is so
short on a medium, or at any season, taking the morning and
evening together, as not to make a very considerable and for-
midable addition to the daily labour of a hard-worked slave,
woidd be a proposition equally unfeeling and false.

It would be so, even were the daily addition no more than
half an hour, i. <?. one quarter of an hour for each twilight,
according to this strange computation ; but in this instance
the enormity of the misrepresentations I have to combat, may
be shewn by witnesses who can neither be silenced nor tra-
duced ; even those of whom it is said, " their line is gone out
" through all the earth, and their words to the end of the
" world ; and that there is no speech or language where their
" voice is not heard." The heavenly luminaries shall prove
for me, that my opponents, to extenuate their oppressions,
have wrested from the tropical day a sixth part of its legiti-
mate domains.

As to the time, during which, on an annual average the sun
is above the horizon, there is no disagreement between us ;
and if there were, I could not suppose any of my readers so
ill-informed, as not at once to decide it for tiiemselves. The

in point of Time. Ill

average time is just twelve hours. Neither can it be necessary
to shew, that in all climates, and at all times, the morning
and evening twilights are of equal duration. The only point,
therefore, on which doubt can arise, is their true medium
length, taking together the different seasons of the year.
Now, the latitude being given, (which in the central parts of
Jamaica is about eighteen degrees north, and in our other
islands, too near that parallel to be worth a separate calcula-
tion,) many of my readers will be able to compute the true
duration of twilight for themselves, on the known astronomical
rule, that it every where begins in the morning when the sun
approaches within eighteen degrees of the horizon, and ends
when the sun has dipped eighteen degrees below it, in the
evening. For the assistance of those, who, like myself are
not expert mathematicians, I have asked the favour of a friend,
who is very eminently such, to calculate for me what is the
shortest, and what the longest duration of twilight in latitude
eighteen north, at different seasons ; and to compute from them
its medium duration throughout the year. He has kindly done
so ; and having submitted his solutions of those problems to
another friend, celebrated for his mathematical skill, who has
confirmed them, I can safely vouch for their accuracy, as con-
tained in a note below.*

The general result, it will be seen, is that instead of the
twilight being on an average a quarter of an hour long, so as

* The shortest twilight in 18 deg. north, is when the sun's declination
is 2 deg. 24 min. south, that is to say, a few days before the vernal and a
few days after the autumnal equinox, about the 13th March, and 29th Sep-
tember. It then commences at 11 minutes before five in the morning, and
the sun rises at 3 min. after 6. Consequently its duration is 1 hour and 14
min., and that of the morning and evening taken together, 2 hours and
28 min.

The longest twilight in the same latitude, viz. at the summer solstice,
June 20th, is 1 hour and 25 min. ; for it begins at 3 min. after 4, and the
sun rises at 28 min. after 5.

The medium duration from 29th September to 13th March, is 1 hour, 17i
min. morning and evening, or together 2 hours, 35 min.

The medium from 13th March to the 29th September, is 1 hour, 19i min.
morning and evening, or 2 hours, 39 min. daily.

The medium duration throughout the year, is 1 hour and 18 min. morn-
ing and evening, or 2 hours. 36 min. daily.

112 Of the Exceas of forced Labour

to make the length of the day, both twilights included, only
twelve hours and a half; it is, when shortest, one hour and
fourteen minutes, and on a medium, one hour and eighteen
minutes ; and taking the morning and evening together, two
hours and thirty-six minutes ; making the average length of
the days two hours and thirty-six minutes throughout the
year. The difference, consequently is about five to one.

Should it be said, that the Jamaica Report, in the passage
extracted, did not mean to speak of the twilight with astrono-
mical correctness ; but had in view only such a portion of it
as gives light enough for the labours of the field ; I reply, that
this explanation cannot be offered for those who rejected the
twilight altogether, as most of the West India witnesses and
writers have done, speaking of twelve hours in the twenty-four
as flight; nor could any impossibility of turning out or working
the slaves in even the faintest twilight, have been in contem-
plation by the Jamaica examinants and reporters, since we
are told by them, " that it was formerly done during a full
" hour in the dark." But I desire not to quarrel with my
opponents about terms ; and am ready to give them the full
benefit of any possible explanation, consistent with the facts
of the case.

I admit that some portion of the twilight, from its com-
mencement in the morning, and previous to its termination in
the evening, is but a scarcely discernible glimmering, and a
larger portion of it but a medium between clear light and
darkness ; though I cannot admit that the utmost faintness of
its light forms a necessary obstacle to field-work, still less to
the turning out the slaves from their huts, or their proceeding
to the often distant place of labour ; for this, as has already been
shewn, would be untrue, and inconsistent with what is ac-
knowledged to be, or what is equally conclusive, to have for-
merly been, the practice. Dr. Collins, too, did not caution his
brother planters against an impussibk fault, when he advised
them not to turn out their slaves before the twilight was well
ascertained ; or untruly allege that the bell was sometimes
rung for that purpose an hour or two before even the first
approach of morning ;* nor will Mr. Divarris be supposed

* See supra, p. 106.

in point of Time. 1 1 3

to have falsely magnified a hardship he wished to extenuate,
in telling us that the slaves still " begin their toil before day."*
I will nevertheless suppose, for argument sake, that there
is a portion of twilight, during which the slaves cannot have
light enough either to work nor walk by ; or what will serve
as well, I will suppose that the planters voluntarily abstain
from compelling them to do so, when the light is not clear
enough for every species of agricultural labour known in this
country.

I am sorry that the proportion of the twilight in that degree
obscure, cannot be ascertained like the duration of the whole,
by mathematical demonstration. It can be known only by
experience ; and experience in a climate like our own, where
clouds and rain, or fogs and mist so generally darken the
morning and evening atmosphere, and are rarely absent from
the skirts of the horizon, when the sun nearly approaches or
actually surmounts it, can teach us little or nothing in respect
of such a climate as that of our West India islands, where the
sun commonly rises and sets with cloudless splendour, and
every twilight ray that precedes his appearance, or follows his
descent, is shot upwards into an atmosphere so clear as to lose
none of its reflection and luminous effect. All we can with
certainty infer is, that whatever proportion the adequate de-
gree of crepuscular light, bears to the inadequate in England,
that proportion must be in a very high degree greater in the
West India islands.

But there are means by -which we may satisfactorily arrive
at some approximation to the truth, without departing from
my rule of using alone the evidence of colonial opponents.
I shall be able at least to shew, that statements which reduce
the twilight, even supposing what I have called adequate twi-
light only was meant, to a quarter of an hour, were extrava-
gantly wide of the truth.

In the first place, the same report which tells us that the
slaves work only in " daij-light" which of course could be
meant to comprise adequate twilight only, tells us elsewhere
that the hours of labour still, are those limited by the Conso-
lidation law. The Honorable James Stewart, Esq. a proprie-

* See supra, p. 106.
VOL. 11. 1

114 Of the Excess of forced Labour

tor, thirty years resident in the island, and member of the
Assembly, being interrogated as to improvements within that
period, in respect of food, clothing, hours of labour, and
punishment, answered as to all but labour, in a way "that shewed
him to have been sufficiently well-disposed to do credit to the
existing system, and to bring forward every assignable im-
provement within his long experience ; but in respect of the
point in question, his words are, " The hours of labour are re-
" gulated by the Consolidated Slave Laiv, to which examinant
" begs leave to refer the Committee ; and he believes the slaves are
" allowed fullf/ the time prescribed by it for refreshment and
" rest." *

I will not stop to shew how decidedly the Committee and
the House were here defeated by their own witness on the
substantive point, the alleged abatement, in practice, of two
hours per diem, out of the statutable time ; which other wit-
nesses also in the same examinations manifestly overthrew jf

* Printed Report, p. 96.

f Two other eminent and long resident proprietors, Mr. Graham and
Mr. Richards,, while supporting the Committee's proposition as to the di-
minution of labour from 12 to 10 hours, attempted to make it out, not by
any change in the time of commencing and ending labour in the field, to
which alone the Act relates, but in very different ways.

The former (p. 56,) expressly says, " ivith regard to the hours ofluboury
" those of ABLE people are much the same as they were when he came to the
" island ;" that is, from day-light, which in this climate is generally from five
" to six in the morning," &c. (adopting in part the sidereal errors liere in
question.) But he adds, " the weakly people and children are indulged, both
" as to the time of going to work in the morning, after dinner, and in leav-
" ing off work in the evening; the average time that the able people work
" will therefore be about ten hours in the twenty-four." (It is obvious that
the word "able" in the last clause must be expunged, in order to make the
testimony either intelligible or consistent with itself. It is perhaps an error
of the press.)

Here, the resort is to cast into an average with the full labours of the
adults, the particular indulgences of the children and iveakly slaves; but to
their case, this controversy as to the time of tield-labour does not at all re-
late ; and there doubtless never was a time when some abatements were not
unavoidably made in their favour. Supposing them now spared more than
formerly, the improvement is no ease to the adult and able slaves. In tak-
ing such weak and irrelevant ground, the witness shewed that he was

in point of Time. 1 15

for my business at present is only to rescue the day-light from
the amputations attempted by the reporters, and my other
antagonists.

If the hours of labour are the same that were prescribed by
the Act, then field-work commences at five in the morning,
and ends at seven in the evening; consequently is carried on
during such a portion of the twilight as amounts on an aver-
age to two hours ; for the sun is so long on an average below
the horizon, between those points of limitation. Either then,
what I have called an " adequate twilight," exists an hour
morning and evening, making two hours daily ; or the work
goes on during that fainter degree of crepuscular light, which
the report, and the other authorities I am combating, call

aware of no better on whiclihis calculation or estimate of ten hours could
be sustained.

Mr. liichards took another course. He said, the slaves, when he first came
to the island (thirty-four years before), worked two hours more than now;
but instead of shewing any such deduction from the legal standard, accord-
ing to the assertion of tlie Committee, his statements, the usual fallacy as
to the length of day excepted, shew like Mr. Graham's, that the present
practice corresponds with that standard ; and he, like Mr. Harris, finds the
improvement, in ascribing to the former planters the having worked their
slaves full one hour before, and one hour after the day ; not however, in the
cane pieces, but in " mak'wg dung and c(i7Ti/ing out gi-nss," (p. 71.) Whe-
ther such employments are now included in, or added to the statutable time
of field-labour, my readers will hereafter be enabled to judge.

Thus we have the same proposition, that the hours of labour have been
reduced to ten, maintained in the same report, from four different sets of pre-
mises, all as irreconcilable with each other, as with the truth of the case : —
the Committee dashingly strikes out an hour and a half from the legal stand-
ard, by an alleged, but unspecified voluntary remission ; one of its witnesses
dropping that standard, and substituting for it the limits of day-light, finds
the improvement in ascribing to former practice two hours of field-work
by night ; another finds it on the same premises, except that it is not field-
work, but nightly dung making and grass carrying, that were the former sub-
jects of excess ; and a third, expressly admitting the hours of labour to be
unchanged, contends, 'that as the children and feeble are spared, their less
share of labour should be taken into average w ith the full time of the adults.
They all however more or less eke out the measure of alleged improvement
by detracting from the length of day-light.

I have not made a partial selection of these witnesses. I have quoted all
who spoke with any specification, either as to the reduction of labour, o its
actual periods.

1 2

1 16 Of the Excess of forced Labour.

night or darkness. On either supposition, my opponents are
short in their reckoning of daily labour, some by two hours,
and all by at least an hour and a half; and on the former
supposition, we have found the proportion we were in quest
of; for the medium of true astronomical twilight being one
hour and eighteen minutes morning and evening, we have to
strike off from each only eighteen minutes, or thirty-six for
the whole day, and the rest, being in the proportion of five to
one, will be a crespuscular light adequate to all the labours of
the field.

But as my opponents may perhaps shift their ground,
choosing the other alternative, and admitting that now, as here-
tofore, the slaves work in what they call darkness, I will offer
another criterion for ascertaining the proportion in question.
At what time do free persons in the West Indies rise to their
ordinary employments, whether without doors or within?

Here also, fortunately, I have hostile testimony of no mean
authority for my purpose. Mr. Dwarris has told us that " aL
" classesrise at gun-fire, i. e.five o'clock in the morning,''* and he
claims the admission of it from us anti-slavery writers, as due
" in common candour"" to his side of the question. It would
certainly be highly uncandid in me not to allow the claim ; for
I well remember, that as often as I slept near enough to a fort
to hear the morning-gun, I was awoke by that loud summons,
if not previously roused by the plantation bells ; and that all
classes of free persons, the very indolent excepted, then rise,
I am far from disputing. I could not, indeed, have affirmed
with certainty from my own recollection, whether the gun was
uniformly fired at five, or whether it was not a little earlier or
later, when the centinel perceived the first glimmering of twi-
light in the east ; but I doubt not Mr. D.'s statement is correct ;
and will therefore assume that five is invariably the true time
of the morning-gun. To me it was like a warning voice to
take care of my health and life ; for without the use of all the
horse exercise that the twilight permitted, my constitution
would not have endured, that, to me, most enervating climate
for eleven years, or a fifth part of that term, finding as I did

* See Note on p. 106-7, supra.

m point of Time. 117

more annoyance than benefit from exercise, except when the
sun was below the horizon. Had the twilig;hts been as short
as the planters now pretend, I should have escaped their pub-
lic enmity, and the poor slaves would have lost a stedfast,
though hitherto, alas! very unsuccessful advocate; for a quar-
ter of an hour would hardly have sufficed for taking the cold
bath, which I always did on rising, and for dressing and mount-
ing my horse. I should therefore have had no morning exercise
at all. When invoked by an advocate on the other side, I
may pardonably thus far depart from the rule of stating nothing
as a witness, and add also to the admission claimed from me,
the following facts ; — that the morning twilight was long
enough in general to afford me a ride of several miles at an
easy pace, after taking the cold bath ; yet, the slaves were
turned out from their huts so long before my outset, that I
generally saw them at their work in the cane-pieces when
passing ; and cannot recollect once hearing the plantation
bells after I left my bed. If I ever did, it must have been
very rarely. Of the evening twilight I made the same use,
from the same necessity, and my rides were then often pro-
tracted beyond the final close of daylight, in its widest sense ;
yet the last living objects which I had light enough to dis-
tinguish in my way, were usually negroes carrying on their
heads bundles of grass they had collected, or standing with
them at the works to await the inspection of the overseer at
the evening grass throwing. It is needless, however, to prove
that the potential duration of work after the setting, must be
full as great as before the rising, sun.

Mr. Dwarris and I then being agreed, that all classes (by
which I understand him to mean, all who are free) rise at five,
if not earlier \for what purposes do they rise so early ? Of course
not for the pleasure of dressing in the dark, or by candle
light. It must be to follow their various occupations, whe-
ther active or sedentary ; for the exercise of which, therefore,
we may certainly infer there is day-light enough at that hour.
Yet as the sun never rises earlier than twenty-eight minutes
after five, and sometimes as late as three minutes after six,
and on an average at six o'clock, there could be no such
light for an hour on a medium, and for about half an hour

118 Oj the Excess of J'oieed LaLoitr

at the very lowest point, if the crepuscle did not give it. It
follows then, from the astronomical data which I have fur-
nished, that the duration of the adequate, is to that of the
entire twilight, upon a medium as sixty to seventy-eight,
forming little less than four-fifths of the whole. At the equi-
noxes, indeed, that proportion would not give adequate light
quite so early as five, by a difference of about five minutes ;
but this is a difference far too minute to prevent our taking,
even at those seasons, five o'clock with sufficient accuracy,
as the latest commencement of adequate day-light, in an at-
mosphere where star-light is so clear that the planet Venus
often casts a shadow behind an object opposed to it. The
obvious general conclusion is, that the length of the day,
measured by the duration of Hght, is for every practical purpose,
fourteen hours instead of twelve, which some, and twelve and
a half, which others of my opponents assign to it.

It may naturally enough be supposed, that I have wasted
my own time and that of my readers, by reasoning so much
at large for the sake of this conclusion, or that of its corro-
lary, that field-work comprises eleven hours and a half of the
twenty-four, after the repeated admissions of both by the
Jamaica legislature ; more especially when I add the recent
and impressive, though tacit renewal of those admissions by
the same authority. I mean in the correspondence between
Mr. Huskisson when Colonial Secretary, and the Governor
and Assembly of that Island, on the disallowance of the new
Consolidation Act of 1826,* by which the old and still exist-
ing limitations of field-labour were meant to be re-enacted ;
for though the assembly applied itself elaborately to re-
move the other objections ; his humane stricture on the
oppressive duration of eleven and a half hours of daily labour
in the field, is passed by without defence or notice. No man
who considers the object and general spirit of those papers,
can doubt for a moment that if the Assembly could have

* See the printed papers presented to Parliament by His Majesty's com-
mand in the year 1828, p. 4, &c.

in point of Time. 1 19

credibly stood by its own pretences of 1815, by alleging a
voluntary abatement in practice of two hours, or one hour
and a half, or even a much smaller improvement, the credit
of it would have been eagerly claimed. It may seem even
that I might have safely relied on Mr. Dwarris's admissions
alone ; considering the official character in which he lately
visited the Island, and that he is both a Jamaica planter, and
a champion of the colonial cause.

Certainly, had I no more to do than to satisfy considerate
and impartial men, my labours in this, and most other parts
of my work, might have been safely and greatly abridged. But
when the reader considers the boundless and fatal credulity with
which reiterated colonial impostures on these subjects, how-
ever clearly refuted, have been received by a large part of the
British public during more than forty years, on the impos-
ing authority of legislative assemblies, and their banded par-
tizans among us, he will perhaps feel with me that I have a
double duty to perform ; not only to establish the true nature
of the case, but to expose the fallacious and deceitful cha-
racter of the means by which it has been hitherto contro-
verted and disguised. With those by whom parties accused
of odious oppressions, are heard with confidence as witnesses
in their own defence, no ordinary impeachment of their credit,
I admit, is likely to prevail. It may be in vain that I have
in a hundred instances shewn their utter contempt of fair
dealing and truth, by citing their own testimony and that
alone against them : but the bold fictions last exposed, and
the means of their exposure, were of so extraordinary a kind,
that if not fatal to the future credit of colonial evidence on
these subjects, it must be because the credulity which pa-
tronizes their bad cause has no possible limit. It is a bold
figurative censure sometimes passed on a man who disputes
notorious truth, that he would " deny the light of day ;" but
my antagonists and their witnesses have literally done so.
In order to hide the true measure of their oppression, the light
o/"(^rty has been actually and seriously denied. During two
hours of the twenty-four, they have "put darkness for light,
" and light for darkness.'' It was, I trust, therefore, no waste
of time, to take issue with them on this point ; and invoke not

120 Of the Excess of forced Labour

only their own evidence and their own records as usual, but
the sun in his course to contradict them.

Having thus, I trust, precluded all rational doubt of the
fact that field-work commences in practice as well as by law,
at five in the morning, and ends at seven in the evening, I
return to the estimate of those further portions of time which
are taken from sleep and from rest, before the actual com-
mencement of the daily field-work, and after its termination.
Let it be supposed that Dr. Collins's advice is now generally
attended to in practice, and that the bell is no longer rung, or
other awakening summons given, an hour or two prematurely,
but strictly as he recommended, when the twilight is very
well ascertained. The supposition is sufficiently favourable ;
for though, as he observes, there is difficulty in avoiding
errors on the one side, there can obviously be little or none on
the other ; and it must be at the peril of the negroes or watch-
men, or both, if they are called too late to muster at the
proper place and time ; but not if they are called too early.
The latest moment to which they can be safely allowed to
sleep is that which will leave them time to put on their clothes,
to prepare themselves with what they have to carry to the
field for the day, and to walk to the place of work, at what-
ever part of the estate that may be. The time necessary, on
an average, for all these preliminary occupations, can be a
subject only of loose conjectural estimate ; but that half an
hour or more, commonly intervenes between the coming out
of all the individuals from their huts, and their general muster
in the field, may be inferred even from a passage in " the West
India Colonies" of Mr. M'Queen ; for truth sometimes peeps
through a crevice in the most finished edifice of falsehood.
This writer, who has the inconceivable confidence to deny that
the driving method of coercion, a practice which his em-
ployers still resolutely refuse to relinquish, has any existence,
and to rail virulently at all who plead for its abolition, as
liars and impostors, affects to refute us by the following
statement. " The persons called drivers, so far from driv-
" ing them to the Jield, leave their houses, and reach the
" places tvhere they are to tvork, at least half an hour before a
*' single negro turns out or approaches the place.'' (p. 256.)

in point of Time. 121

The proposition thus strangely contradicted and refuted
was in words, cited I believe from a work of my own, viz.
that the slaves were driven " to their loork, and at their work,"
wliich he here pretends to understand as if it meant that they
were driven from their huts to the place at which they are
mustered before the work commences; a statement that would
have been almost as absurd as most of those by which Mr.
M'Queen has insulted the understandings of his readers ; for
it is manifest that if the negroes were mustered in that way,
every individual, on turning out from his hut, must have a
driver behind him to urge him forward. There must, in other
words, be as many drivers as workmen. It was a miserable sub-
terfuge, worthy of himself, to ascribe such a meaning to his op-
ponent. But he here lets out in part the truth of the case, by
noticing, for his deceitful purpose, the precession of the driver ;
who of course does not go to the field half an hour before
his human team, merely to enjoy a soliloquy prior to their
arrival. The fact is, that he goes there as soon as he can
after the bell-ringing, in order to give the second call with
his whip ; thereby indicating the spot of the general muster ;
and stays there to note the times of the successive arrivals of
the slaves, which vary of course with the strength or speed
of each, or their quickness in turning out from their huts,
and to punish on the spot, those who arrive too late.

Many of these observations as to the morning muster,
apply equally to the evening dismission from the field, the
twilight being equal in duration to the dawn.

It is after that period that the slaves, when not taxed, as
we shall see they often are, with further work for the mas-
ter, have to " plod homeward their weary way," from the
most distant part perhaps of a large estate, to their huts ;
and subsequently to provide for themselves that evening meal,
which usually supplies to them, as we have seen, the want of
a dinner; and to provide also for the next morning's break-
fast, if they are to have one.

Strangers to the case cannot easily imagine how much,
and what various incidental employment, these necessary
duties of the evening involve. The negro, be it again remem-
bered, though he may be a husband or a father, has no wife
or children at home to prepare his meals for him on his re-

122 Of the Excess qfj'uned Labour

turn from the field ; nor has he, like our English labourers,
money to lay out, and a baker's or chandler's shop to go
to, where he can buy his food in a state fit for immediate
use.

Even where provisions are supplied to him from the plan-
tation stores, he receives them in a state neither fit for eating,
nor for any culinary process, without much previous prepara-
tion. The most favourable case is an allowance ofjiour, or coni
meal; but this, though leavened bread is a luxury unknown
to him, must be kneaded of course, and made into a cake or
dumpling, before he can boil or bake it. The articles more
commonly served out, where vegetable food is allowed by the
master, is unground Guinea or Indian corn, or maize, with
their horny coats, or horse beans ; * and upon these he must

* I must not here anticipate too largely the subject of subsistence, which
properly belongs to subsequent chapter ; but as these statements may seem
strange to many of my readers, I subjoin here the following extracts: —
" It required," says Mr. De la Beche, " one thousand bushels of Guinea
" corn to supply the negroes during the year ; the average crop of Guinea
" corn on the estate is about 1400 bushels, so that near two-thirds of the
" labour expended in this kind of cultivation was solely for their own
" benefit." — (Here we have the standing fallacy, that raising his own food
is for the slave's benefit, not the master's.) " It used," adds the same
writer, " to be the custom to give every negro on the property a gallon of'
" Guinea corn on the Sunday morning, when they had not been allowed the
" previous Saturday for themselves ; but in consequence of having had
" every Saturday given them out of crop during the last year, they have
" not asked, and consequently have not received, any very great assistance
^* from the corn store. About sixty persons, consisting of invalids, chil-
" dren, the stock keepers, and domestics, receive a gallon of corn each per
" week all the year round." — Notes, &c. p. 8, 9.

These are the words, not of an unfeeling or sordid, but of a liberal and
benevolent planter, in his account of the management of his own estate in
Jamaica ; where, however, I understand that the slaves in general are sup-
plied with no provisions except a few salt herrings from the master's store,
but depend on their own grounds for support. If they are not on that ac-
count the worse fed, which I will not here enquire, their evening and other
labours out of gang, are of course not the less.

As to the use of horse-beans in other colonies, I give the following extract
from Dr. Collins : — " Horse-beans are given to the negroes on many estates
" in the Windward Islands for their allowance. If ground into flour, or bruised
■" in a mill, perhaps no great objection would attend their use ; but if other-
" wise, they are an execrable food ; — for as it would be troublesome to the

in point of Time. 1 23

perform the process of trituration how he may ; for no mill of
any kind is provided : he must grind or pound them laboriously
between such large stones as he can find for the purpose,
before he can knead them into a loaf or cake for the fire ; but
more commonly, as appears from my last quotation, is con-
tent to boil and eat them husks and all. As to the cassada
or manioc, it requires both to be dried and rasped, or grated
into meal, before any further preparation of it as food ; but
this, with calavansa beans, and other native pulse or veget-
ables, on which the negroes feed, are, I apprehend, very
rarely if ever, supplied by the master. They belong, there-
fore, to another and more onerous class of occupations, the
gathering and bringing from the provision grounds, such arti-
cles of supply.

But these are by no means all the incumbrances on the
period of pretended rest; for at what other time can they
collect and carry home the wood they use for fuel, or the
water which they want for culinary purposes, and to allay
their thirst, on that and the following day ?

Comparatively fortunate is the poor slave, especially in the
Leeward Islands, who has a spring of water within two or
three miles of his hut; and a great majority are obliged to
resort for it to the plantation well at the works, where it is,
for the most part, to be drawn from a great depth. If we add
to these particulars of daily occurrence, the washing and
mending their clothes, the keeping their flimsy huts and
their working tools in repair, and the various other occasional
occupations that naturally fall on men and women who are left
in all such matters to shift for themselves, it will be plain

" proprietor to dress daily so many of them as would serve his whole gang,
" they are given out undressed ; and it is left to the negroes to do the best
" they can with them. Now beans being of a close and flimsy texture,
" and requiring a great deal of time and cookery to prepare them for the
" stomach, and your negroes having very little of either to spare, they are
" swallowed half boiled, or quite raw ; in which case they impart about as
" much nourishment to the body as so many bullets," &c. He adds, " As
" the negroes, contrary to an opinion which has been erroneously enter-
" tained, are generally provided with very bad grinders, a great part of
" the grain which is used for their diet is swallowed whole, and rendered in
" the same state ; of course it is eaten to little purpose." — Practical Rules,
&c. p. 97,98.

124 Of the Excess of forced Labour

that much time must be wanted to supply their own necessi-
ties after the work of the field is ended.

It is by no means universally true, however, that labour
directly and unequivocally for the master's benefit, even out
of crop, terminates with their dismission by the drivers.

They then cease, it is true, to work in gang, the crop season
excepted, till the following dawn ; but they have various
evening services afterwards to perform on the master's ac-
count, as well as their own ; and some of them of a very
onerous kind.

By far the worst of these solitary labours, is the tedious
and fatiguing drudgery of grass-picking, Mr. Ramsay's ac-
count of which is already before my readers ; and I have
little if any thing to add to it, except a few explanatory re-
marks ; and except that, as I waived all benefit from his testi-
mony, because he was a foe to slavery, its verity remains to be
proved.

Here, however, a distinction must be pointed out, of much
real, though much more apparent importance. There are
colonies, and Jamaica is one of them, in which this practice,
though prevailing extensively, is not in its nature so onerous as
in the Leeward Islands. They have so much land there in most
plantations unfit for the growth of sugar, or on which there are
not hands enough for extending to the utmost that most profit-
able species of agriculture, that most planters have adopted
the practice of laying out artificial grass pieces to provide
provender for their horses, mules, and other working cattle :
and many of them have also penns or grazing grounds, where
their sheep and other live stock feed ; whereas in St. Christo-
pher, and several others of our older and fully settled islands,
almost every rood of land capable of raising exportable pro-
duce, has long since been avariciously devoted to that pur-
pose.

Of course, therefore, there is generally speaking, in such
colonies, no room for grass pieces, except at a height on the
mountain ridges too distant and steep for cultivation, and
where there is but a short native sward, fit only for a few
sheep or goats to browse upon.

A consequence calamitous to the poor slaves is, that except
in crop-time, when the canc-tops serve for provender, the

in point of Time. 125

horses, mules, cattle, and live stock of every kind, not even
excepting the sheep and goats on most estates, are fed ex-
clusively on native grass and weeds plucked stem by stem
by the hands of the negroes ; and which they are obhged to
search for in the hedge-rows, the ranges, the fallowed cane-
pieces, and the steep sides of deep guts or ravines by which
the country is copiously intersected.

As vegetation in that climate is astonishingly quick, especi-
ally in the rainy season, which begins about the close of the
crop, these resources in general are much more copious than
might be supposed ; but when a short drought occurs, the
slaves are often obliged to ascend high into the mountain
grounds of their own or the neighbouring estates, to find the
ordinary tale of grass ; and on low-land plantations, many of
which have no mountain ground at all, their task is peculiarly
laborious. At best it is in a high degree oppressive; for the
daily consumption of such green food by all the cattle and
live stock of a plantation which have, generally speaking,
out of crop-time no other subsistence whatever, a little corn
imported for the horses excepted, must obviously be very
great; and there is not a handful, or scarcely a stalk of it,
that has not cost a stoop to some weary slave, besides long
walks in its collection.

This work has been naturally, but most inadequately com-
pared to the Egyptian straw-gathering ; while in almost
every other point, that ancient bondage, though called " an
iron yoke and a furnace of affliction," affords a striking con-
trast, rather than a parallel, to the slaverj'^ of the West Indies.

The time allowed for this tedious labour of grass-picking
in the Leeward and Windward islands, is, first, that noon-tide
interval, not less falsely, in this case, called a respite, than a
dinner-time, and all the twilight that remains from the dimis-
sion in the evening, to the " grass-throwing," as it is termed,
the true close of the daily labour for the master.

Nor is this final process of very short duration ; for as the
individuals of the gang finish their respective collection of
such bundles as they hope may pass muster, and arrive with
them at the homestall, naturally at very unequal times, ac-
cording to their different degrees of strength, and of success
in their wide-spread individual searches, many of them of
course must wait long for the rest, in order to a simultaneous

126* Of the Kxcess of forced Lahnur

delivery of their bundles, at the same place. Yet the de-
livery is required to be simultaneous ; for otherwise, the over-
seer, to whom the important duty of inspecting the bundles
is assigned, might have to stand an hour or more in the sun,
or in the evening dew, or in the rain, to pass judgment on
every slave, as he successively arrives. That judgment, too,
I admit, would, sometimes be more severe than it is, if this
practice were altered : for when the general amount of grass
is thought sufficient, the overseer is able to connive a little at
the scanty contribution of individuals, who plead either the
ill success of their search, or fatigue, or ill health, to excuse
the smallness of their respective bundles.

The practice is, that when all the slaves have arrived, or
are thought to have had sufficient time for the purpose, the
driver, who always attends to punish delinquents on the spot,
draws them up in line, each having his or her bundle or
bundles on the head ; and then calls out the overseer, who
goes leisurely along the line, examining every load, and if
satisfied, simply directs it to be thrown down on the general
heap; but if not, orders the instant punishment of the de-
faulters, having regard to the degree of each particular de-
ficiency.

This process being ended, the poor slaves may retire, to
re-assemble in the field at two, if it be in the afternoon ; or if
it be the evening grass-throwing, to prepare that meal which
their luxury, we are told, makes them prefer to a dinner.
Perhaps it will be surmised, that they have rather a better
reason, than luxurious self-indulo-ence for declinino- to dine,
especially in the grass-picking colonies, when dismissed on a
distant cane-piece at noon, and obliged to reappear there, at
the two-o'clock muster, under pain of immediately feeling
the smart of the torturing cart whip.

But after reading Mr. Ramsay's account, and these further
illustrations of my own, neither of which, by my agreement,
are to be taken as evidence, the reader may desire to see them
sufficiently verified. I will, therefore, here adduce again,
the unimpeached and indisputable testimony of Dr. Col-
lins.

** The picking of grass," says that writer, " in situations
" where it is most abundant, is a labour more felt and regretted
" by the negroes than others much more severe ; yet, as the

in point of Time. 127

" cattle must be fed, it would be advisable to assign a certain
" portion of the land to the production of Guinea-grass; a
" little sacrifice of interest, is better than a oreat oneofneo^ro
** comfort."*

In another place he says, " The neglect of grass-picking, is
" another frequent cause of punishment. On some estates,
" it draws more stripes upon the negroes, than all their other
*• offences put together ; as the lash seldom lies idle while the
•' grass-roll is calling over. It is to be lamented, that this
*' work is so essential, as not to be entirely dispensed with ;
" for as it is to be performed when the negroes are retired
" from the field, and no longer under the eye of the overseer,
" or the driver, it is apt to be neglected. Besides, it en-
" croaches much on the time allotted to their own use ; and even
" aftei- they have with mtich trouble picked their bundles, they
" are frequeuthj stolen from them by fnore artful and less
*' industrious negroes, and their excuses, however just, are seldom
" admitted to extenuate their fault."

After again recommending the substitution of Guinea-grass,
or other artificial grasses, to be cultivated on spots to be al-
lotted to that purpose, he adds, " However, where there is
" no waste ground that can be assigned to that use, or at
" least not to a sufficient extent to supersede the necessity of
" picking the natural grass out of the hedges, or cane-pieces,
" the quotas which the negroes are assessed ought not to be
" rigorously exacted from them. They who make default
" but seldom should be overlooked, whilst they who offend
*' more frequently, should only be compelled to repair their
" neglect by bringing a double quantity at the next call. In
" general they would do so, and you would profit more by the
" fine than by the punishment, and your negroes would escape
" the whip, which is too intemperately employed on this occa-
" sion, as on others ; but the misfortune is, it is always at hand,
" and therefore supplies the readiest means of punishing ; for
" the overseer having such a summary mode of balancing
" offences, never thinks of any other, which demanding fore-
" sight, and taxing his recollection, would engage him in a
" more complex system of government. "f

Practical Rules, &c. p. 192-3. f Ibid. 204-5.

128 0/ the Excess of' forced Labour

Though Dr. ColHns does not expressly state that the whole
of the noontide respite from the drivers is employed in grass-
picking, and the subsequent attendance at the roll-calling for
its delivery ; such I think may be fairly inferred to be the
case, from different passages in his work, in addition to those
I have here cited. He says, for instance, in his advice as to the
intervals in the morning and mid-day. " At noon they must
" have two full hours before they are summoned to throw their
" grass ; and at night, if out of crop, they retire from the field
" with the sun."* There could be no reason why the grass-
throwino; should be reserved to the end of the allotted two
hours, except that they would not, otherwise, always have
sufficient time for collecting and bringing it in, without too
much hurry and fatigue. And if the task generally or often
employs two full hours at noon, it cannot well be supposed to
employ less in the evening, when the slaves have been fa-
tigued with the whole gang- work labours of the day. In
point of fact, too, the quantity exacted at evening, is generally
the largest ; because it is to serve all the stock through
the night, and till the following noon. Dr. Collins says no-
thing as to the time of grass-throwing in the evening ; but if
the negroes ''retire from the field, (i.e. from the gang-work)
" with the sun," which is, on a medium, six o'clock, and where
grass-picking prevails, they are I believe often dismissed thus
early, it may be inferred that the grass-throwing is not finish-
ed on an average sooner than between seven and eioht ; and
this perfectly accords with Ramsay's account, or shows
at least that he used no exaggeration ; for his words are
" about seven o'clock in the evening, or later, according to
" the season of the year, when the overseer can find lei-
" sure, they are called over by list to deliver in their second
" bundles of grass,"

Mr. Ramsay, in the same account, may, when compared
with Dr. Collins and most other colonial apologists, be
thought more than sufficiently favourable to the planters ; for
he spoke of the evening grass-picking, we have seen, as begin-
ning " about half an hour before sunset,'" instead of their " re-
" tiring with the sun' from the gang-work. Here, however,

* P. 189. We must obviously read " should retire ;" but I will not cor-
rect the typographical error.

7)1 point o) Time. 129

he was incorrect only in using general terms to describe what,
though a very frequent, is a local and occasional, not the ge-
neral practice. In St. Christopher, where he lived, the grass-
picking is, for the reason I have given, pre-emiiiently tedious ;
and when the weather has been more than usually dry, it is
often necessary, especially on low-land estates, to dismiss the
gang from the cane-pieces half an hour before sunset, in order
that they may have time and light enough to collect bundles
sufficiently large. By no other writer within my recollection
is a dismission by the drivers before sunset alleged.

And here I cannot but digress a moment to observe how
fully, and in how many particulars, Dr. Collins's work, re-
published by an eminent colonial agent and apologist of sla-
very within the present century ; and first printed at least
Jifteen years later than that of Mr. Ramsay, is found to con-
firm his statements, and give a posthumous triumph to the
character of that very worthy, but much calumniated
man. In a passage that I omitted before, he had pointed
out this further occasional aggravation of the miseries of
grass-picking; " On their return from a neighbouring height,
" often some lazy fellow of the intermediate plantation, with
" the view of saving himself the trouble of picking his own
" grass, seizes on them, and pretends to insist on carrying
" them to his master for picking grass, or being found on his
" grounds ; a crime that forfeits the bundle, and subjects the
*' offender to twenty lashes of a long cart-whip of twisted
" leather thongs. The wretch is fain to escape with the loss
" of his bundle, &c. The hour of delivering in his grass ap-
" proaches, while hunger importunately solicits him to re-
•' member its call; but he must renew the irksome toil," &c.*

Let this be compared with the lines I have printed with
italics in the last extract from Dr. Collins. Indeed I hardly
know a single stricture of Mr. Ramsay's on the oppressive
treatment of slaves, that has not since his death been abun-
dantly confirmed by writers of the same party with those
who hooted him into his grave as a libeller and a liar. His
only crime was the holding up to public abhorrence in this

* P. 70.

VOL. 11. K

130 Of the E.ness of Juiced Labour

country, a system of which they now admit that his general
reprobation was just; since they now confess that when he
wrote, and for twenty years after, the poor slaves were barba-
rously oppressed, in practice as well as by law.

On the Saturday evenings, the picking of grass must by
an obvious necessity be enforced to much more than its usual
extent, to rescue the sabbath, if in fact rescued, from that
burthen. When we are told, therefore, that Saturday after-
noon is given to the slaves for themselves, or for the working
their own grounds, we should recollect that there is this
heavy incumbrance upon it for the direct and unequivocal use
of the master. To exempt the sabbath entirely, thrice the
usual quantity must be thrown the evening before.

The sabbath itself, however, is encroached upon for the same
purpose, " no work is ever required of them by their master on
*' Sundays," said the council and assembly of St. Christopher,
" except the picking a bundle of giass on Sunday evenings,
"■ which usually (they had the confidence to add) does not
" require half an hour."* They meant it to be supposed,
perhaps, that the grass springs in more abundant quantities
on Sundays than other days; not, indeed, altogether to pre-
vent the profanation of that day, but to enable the slaves to
perform in half an hour what costs them three or four hours
daily at other times.

The reader may suppose that here, at least, there has pro-
bably been some improvement, since the era of alleged atten-
tion to the spiritual state of the black population commenced ;
let him compare, then, this admission of 1789, with the latest
statement on the subject, of equal authority, on the colonial
side, which I extract from the examinations taken and trans-
mitted by the council of Barbadoes, in 1824, in opposition to
the reformations recommended by the crown and parliament.

" It is usual, on most estates, for the negroes on Sunday
" mornings to bring up with them a bundle of grass at eight
" o' clock, and receive their allowances for that day, after
"■ which they are never called upon to do any thing; and
'* Saturday afternoons are very commonly given to them —

* Privy Council Report on the Slave Trade, part 3, title Grenada and
St. Christopher, A. No. 9.

/// po'mt of Time. 131

" that on some estates he has abolished the bringing of grass
" on Sunday mornings, which, however, occupies a very short
" time."*

Here we have the same difficulties as in the account of
the evening grass-throwing on Sundays at St. Christopher.
If there is but one picking on the sabbath, it must be equal
in quantity to two on other days, unless the cattle and stock
are put on short allowance. And what are we to understand
by " a very short time ?" If not nearly or full three hours, it
would be a great and wanton hardship on the poor slaves to
delay the grass-throwing till eight o'clock ; as well as a need-
less violation of the sabbath, to make that the time for dis-
tributing their allowances. It would be to rob them without
profit to the master, of the time that they might have em-
ployed, if earlier dismissed, in going to their provision
grounds, or to the Sunday market, or in preparing for the
latter after their usual time of rising, whether that was four
or five o' clock. It is, therefore, a conclusion, not only the
most natural, but the least unfavourable to the planter's
humanity, that they cannot on an average gather and bring
to the works grass enough for the use of the day, earlier
than eight ; in other words, this " very short time" probably
employs two or three hours of tedious and wearisome work.
In the usual style of these admissions we are told of " bring-
" ing with them a bundle of grass,'' as if they found it at their
huts, and had nothing to do but to carry it, instead of having
to roam over the whole estate to find and pluck it blade by
blade. As this is the best case the Barbadoes council could
dress up for use in this country, who can doubt that the
acknowledged grievance of grass-picking is full as bad at this
period as it was above forty years ago ? The same will be
found to be the case in every point; or at least in all that I
mean to investigate, the economical oppressions of the system.

To this I will add another extract from an account still
more recent, the work of June, 1829, to which I have before
referred.f " Upon Sunday evenings all the negroes of both

* Examination of Forster Clarke, Esq., a proprietor of a plantation in
Barbadoes, and attorney for 19 estates of absentees. Printed Report, 108-
f See supra, p. 29, 30.

K 2

132 Of the Excess of forced Labour

*' sexes, except the children, have to muster with a bundle of
'* grass for the cattle, which is cut from the open spaces which
" divide the cane fields, and from other parts of the estate.
" Upon some properties, this is required in the morning as
" well as the evening."*

As the drudgery of grass-picking is from local circumstances,
considerably mitigated in Jamaica, and perhaps in some other
colonies, it may be thought that the field-negroes there have
more spare time for themselves. Though I am far from denying
the importance of that distinction, the effect of much abridging
the entire time of labour may be questioned ; not only be-
cause the gang is in consequence detained longer, as we have
seen, in the cane-fields, but because the same diversity of
local circumstances leads to a larger reliance on native pro-
visions, and gives the slaves consequently more work to do
at their noontide and evening hours, in providing their own
subsistence, than in places where they are chiefly sustained
by imported articles of food.

For proof of the former proposition, we need only to com-
pare Mr. Ramsay's statements as to the times of dismission
from the cane-pieces in St. Christopher, with those of colo-
nial witnesses and writers, whose statements relate to Ja-
maica ; for his authority, when on the extenuatory side, will
not, I presume, be disputed ; and he represented the noontide
respite as well as evening dismission to be earlier, and the
former to be of longer d uration than any of the Jamaica gen-
tlemen allege ; making the field-Work stop, according to va-
riant usage on different plantations, at " eleven o'clock, or
" noon,'' and the respite to vary from an hour and a half to
near three hours ; and he dates the evening dismission, as we
have seen, at half an hour before sun-set.t It would appear,
therefore, that the noontide, as well as evening time of ab-
sence from the gang-work, is longer on a medium by half an
hour at the least, making together one hour in the day, at St.
Christopher's than in Jamaica.

* Observations upon the State of Negio Slavery in the Island of Santa
Cruz, p. 89.

t See supra, p. 70, 71.

/// point of Ti/ne. J 33

Mr. Beckforcl, says, " that there tlie slaves seldom continue
" in the field out of crop after sunset, which is never later
" than seven."* And even Mr. Bryan Edwards was content
to say, " At sunset, or veri/ soon after, they are released for the
" night;" he adds, " the drudgery of grass-picking so much
" complained of in some of the islands to windward, being
" happily unknown in Jamaica. "f The latter assertion is
one of the very numerous instances in which that plausible,
but most disingenuous defence of slavery, called a History
of the West Indies, has misled not only the enemies of the
negroes, but their friends. I confess that I was myself in
this instance, deceived by it ; never having been in Jamaica,
and not thinking it probable that the author, an eminent
planter of the island, and long resident there, would have
ventured to call a practice unknown there, if it had been in
any degree commonly used. The fact, as I am now well in-
formed is, that the distinction is rather in degree, than in
kind ; for though the slaves in Jamaica have not, generally
speaking, far to go for grass, or to collect it by such tedious
pickings as in St. Christopher and other islands, they have
to cut it, when grass pieces are planted for the purpose ; and
when not, as is more commonly the case, to go through the
common process of grass-picking as here described ; except
that from its abundance, that process is not near so difficult
and tedious as in those fully cultured and dry weather islands ;
and however the grass is obtained, it is a duty of the slaves
after their dismission from gang-work in the field, to go for
it, and bring in their individual cuttings or collections to the
homestall. The latter proposition seems to require no evi-
dence ; for how otherwise could the horses and other working
cattle, be provendered at night ?

But happily, even here, I have express authority on the
colonial side, to warrant my giving the result of anti-slavery
information, (for such I admit it is) without any violation of
my rule. I refer to an extract before given from the Jamaica
Report of 1815, (supra, p. 115.) where one of the witnesses.

* Remarks on the situation of Negroes in Jamaica, by Mr. Beckford
p. 45.

t Hist, of the West Indies, vol. ii. book 4. chap. .5.

134 OJ the Excess of forced Labour

Mr. Richards, noticed among the evening labours of the
slaves, not only the making dung, but " carrying grass.'^ It
is true he spoke of these as labours which formerly employed
the slaves an hour after dark, but it was in that point alone
that any improvement was alleged or hinted in this respect,
by him or any other witness ; nor can any change be supposed
that could have rendered the making dung and carrying grass
less necessary than before, as parts of the ordinary labours
of a sugar estate. They may be no longer performed after
dark, though the various and vague uses of that term, and its
correlatives, throughout the report, make it difficult to say
whether any such change has, or even is affirmed to have
taken place ; but if grass is still carried by the slaves of Ja-
maica in the evening, it must be after seven o'clock ; and in
order to be carried, it must be first collected and formed into
bundles, whether by plucking or cutting.

For these reasons, though I admit the drudgery of pro-
viding food for the cattle and live stock, to be less onerous
on the slaves in Jamaica than in some other colonies, it must
even there, form no inconsiderable addition to the daily gang-
work or labour in the cane- pieces; and I am strongly in-
clined to believe that if the time it occupies could be ascer-
tained, and added to the difference of gang-work time which
I have noticed, the slaves of that island would be found lit-
tle benefited by the distinction ; except by avoiding in a great
degree the innumerable punishments inflicted in other colonies
for deficiencies in their bundles of o rass.

This, mdeed, is perfectly natural ; because the grand prac-
tical principle pervading the whole system, and the necessary
eflPect also of avarice long spurred on by commercial compe-
tition, is the exaction from the poor slaves of the maximum
of labour, that their time and strength can, without certain
and speedy destruction, possibly afford.

But let me now resume my computation of the actual
time of labour. — It has been sufficiently shewn, I trust, that
this, in the lightest season of work, would be most falla-
ciously and inadequately estimated, by counting the hours only
of the collective labours of the gang, under the driver's'coer-
cion in the field ; though such is the uniform rule of the colonial
apologists ; and it has been shewn to be the result of their

in point of Time. 135

own data, that even this rule, gives, on an average, not less
than eleven hours and a half" in the twenty-four; except
where the time is somewhat shortened in order to extend
in an equal degree the harassing process of grass-picking.

What addition, then, ought to be made, in a fair estimate,
for what we cannot call the voluntary, or unforced, but may
define, in general, as the solitary labours of the slaves, in order
to distinguish them from those of the collected gangs, per-
formed in the presence of the drivers,and by direct compulsion ?

Some of their solitary toils, such as their walks to and
from the place of the morning and afternoon muster, will, per-
haps, be undisputed additions, at least to the charges on their
time, and abridgments of their rest; because they are un-
avoidable incidents to what the colonists allow to be " work
/or the master.'' But I must take leave to difier from them
in their common views of this subject ; and to add also to the
amount, what the slaves have to do for their own subsistence ;
though this is treated by my opponents as if it were mere re-
laxation and rest ; or as if labour had no tendency at all to
weary the frames of the slaves, except when its immediate
subject is the raising or manufacturing of sugar.*

• Though such views are too preposterous to deserve serious refutation,
it may be right to shev? that they have been and still are gravely and ex-
pressly maintained. They are plainly implied in all the numerous state-
ments and calculations I have cited, which reduce the hours of labour to
those which are assigned by the same authorities to gang-'work in the field ;
or which count the time of labour from five in the morning to seven in the
evening, deducting two hours and a half for breakfast and dinner ; and
many of them we have seen, expressly call all the rest of the twenty-four
hours, time of relaxation and rest.

It may, however, be worth remarking here, that all the witnesses exa-
mined before the Privy Council, who spoke to the times of respite or relax-
ation, did so in answer to Q. A. No. 9, which was in the following terms :
" Are any days or hours set apart in which the slaves may labour for them-
" selves ?" and that it was in answering this question that they carefully
took credit, not only for the Sabbath, and two days or three at Christmas,
and for an occasional Saturday afternoon out of crop, but for the two hours
respite at mid-day, and for an undefined portion of time after the evening
dismission ; in other words, for all the time that the slaves do, or possibly
can employ in raising their own provisions. They all, therefore, plainly

136 Of the Excess of forced Labour

Not doubting that all my readers who are not slave-mas-
ters, will feel with me on this point, and think that the por-
tions of time employed in the culture of provision grounds,
or unavoidably spent in other occupations necessary to
the slave's support, such as gathering and bringing home
the produce of his ground, the preparing and dressing his
food, collecting fuel, and drawing and carrying water, &c.
ought to be included in our calculations of his daily toil,
my only difficulty will be to shew, what in point of time is
their actual amount; which, it is obvious, as to the daily
respites from gang-work, can be averaged only by probable
conjecture.

Let it be supposed that an hour must, on a medium,
be wanted between the bell-ringing on the first approach
of dawn, and the commencement of work in the cane-
piece, and two hours for the various employments that
must succeed its evening termination, before the slave can
retire to sleep ; and let it be further supposed, that only
one hour of the two at noon is employed, on an average,
in any laborious way, where grass-picking is not required
at that period. This, when we take into account the walks
to and from the field at noon, of all who do not lie down on
the spot, will be thought, I trust, a very moderate estimate. We
shall if so, have to add four hours per diem of solitary labours,
to the eleven hours and a half of gang-work ; making together
fifteen hours and a half in the twenty-four : in which calcu-
lation I regard the breakfast-time as entire and absolute rest.
But to preclude all objection and doubt, and take every thing
below the truth, I will strike off half an hour from that
amount ; and suppose fifteen hours only to be the average
time out of the crop-season, during which the negro is either
at hard work in the field, or in bodily action of some other

considered the slave when raising his own subsistence ds working "for him-
self."

Some of them went further, expressly giving the name of rest and " ex-
" emption from labour," to that necessary toil. ' Sundays throughout the
" year" said the agents and planters of Jamaica, " are days of rest which
" they have entirely to themselves." " Sunday," said the Council of Barba-
does, " is a day of course totally exempt from labour." Yet see supra, 131.

in point of Time. 137

kind, either for the master's immediate benefit, or his own
support.

Were we to stop here, we should have a truly appalling
excess of oppression. Even in this climate, it would be so ;
more especially if imposed on agricultural labourers ; and at
all seasons of the year. How much more oppressive, then, in
the Torrid Zone, where the native propensities of mankind
are so strongly opposed to arduous long-continued toil ; and
where the labourer, while working under the solar blaze, is
subject to an exhausting perspiration, such as the English
peasant is rarely annoyed by, even in our summer days. But
the latter works on an averao;e not more than nine hours, as I
shall hereafter fully shew.

Much, however, of the sad story of the poor sugar-planta-
tion slave is yet untold. We have hitherto considered only
his labours out of the crop-season, when they are much the
lightest in point of time. Let us next enquire what they are
during that long-protracted West India harvest, called the
time of crop.

We have before seen that the comparative severity of
forced labour during that large portion of the year, is uni-
versally admitted ; and that its diurnal continuance is quite
unlimited by law. The meliorating acts have prudently got
rid of the subject, by leaving it wholly unnoticed, and con-
fining their regulations to the season out of crop alone.

During the crop-months, the planter's profits depend more
even than they do at other seasons, on the quantum of labour
that he compels his slaves to perform in a given time ; for
there is danger of much detriment, both in the quality and
quantity of his produce, if the canes are not cut and ground,
and their juice manufactured by boiling, with all possible ex-
pedition, as soon as they are ripe enough for the purpose;
and the consequence is, that forced labour has no limits, but
such as nature irresistibly prescribes. Both by day and by
night the negroes are put to the full stretch of their physical
powers.

Lest these propositions should be thought too strong at
the outset, let me here cite a recent report of the venerable
Church Society for promoting Christian Knoivledge. The Right
Reverend Governors, who must have concurred, at least in

138 Of the Excesa of forced Labour

framing that report, will not be suspected of exaggeration ;
and yet it has the following passage : — "The task of con-
" veying religious instruction to uneducated adults is rendered
*' doubly difficult in the case of the negro, who is kept to
** hard labour at all seasons of the year, and works during
" the harvest with the least possible intei'tnission."*

I have already shewn the former proposition too well
founded ; and shall soon prove the latter literally true.

To enable my readers to judge what the practice generally
is in the crop months, I will here cite, as I have done in re-
spect of the labour out of crop, a few authorities relative to
different sugar colonies, and at different periods, from the
first public enquiries to the present time ; from which it will
appear, as in the former case, that the practice is strikingly
uniform throughout the West Indies, and has, during forty
years at least, received no mitigation.

To begin with the Privy Council Report and Parliamen-
tary evidence of 1790.

" Crop-time, our harvest," said the legislative council of
Jamaica, " may be deemed hard labour, as the work in the
" boiling houses is continued day and night."f

" When I speak of the ease of labour," said Sir Ralph
Payne, afterwards Lord Lnvington, who spoke chiefly of
Antigua and St. Kitts), " I speak of it comparatively with
" that of a day-labourer in England ;" (he had before made,
as we have seen, that extravagant comparison) " and I
" meant principally out of crop. Li crop time the labour is
" certainly sever eS'X

" A field negro," said Mr. Campbell, an eminent planter of
Grenada, " is the same time at labour at crop-time, as out
*' of crop-time ; but in Grenada and the other ceded islands,
" we keep about the works and the boiling of sugar all night ;
** from which circumstance, we commonly divide our gang
" into three spells of boilers, people to attend the mill, fire-
" men, and men to carry out cane-trash. This work requires
" the labour of from twenty to thirty slaves, according to the

* Report for 1828, p. 55.

t Privy Council Report, Q. A. No. 36.

t Commons Report of 1790, p. 442.

ill point oj' Time. 139

" number of coppers that are boiling. These spells are changed
" at midnight, so that it only comes on every third night that
" they lose their rest of six hours, and when estates are fully
" slaved, there are often four spells."*

Dr. Athill, a planter of Antigua, gave a detail of the num-
ber of slaves necessary for the various works at the boiling
house, and added, " they amount, in the whole, when all the
** work, is going on with spirit, to between twenty and thirty
" negroes, so that there are few left to cut the canes, drive
" the cart, and do the other work, except on very well-handed
" estates. "f

That there were in this respect few " very well-handed," or
to use Mr. Campbell's phrase, ^^ fully slaved estates," was
manifest from the statements of almost every witness to whom
the standing question, whether the Islands were sufficiently
stocked with slaves, was put. The last cited witness, for ex-
ample, said in answer to a question. Whether the estates in
Antigua were to his knowledge, during his stay there, pro-
perly stocked ? " By far the greater part were not ; some few
" estates had perhaps more than they required. "J And he
further stated, that " on some estates the canes are cut one
" day and ground the next, from the planter not having
" sufficient negroes to supplij the sugar works and the Jield at
"the same time."^ Yet Antigua in this respect was gene-
rally considered as one of the most fortunate of our islands.
It is manifest, therefore, that the case of estates so " fully
" slaved," as to supply four spells, must have been very rare
indeed. If so before the abolition, it must of course be still
rarer now. But as those who are still credulous enough to
listen to the oft-told and oft-retracted tale, of humane im-
provements, may doubt, perhaps, whether some expedient
has not been found to relieve the wearied slaves from night
labour after the toils of the day, I will show what the prac-
tice still is, or was at least, so recently as 1825, on the deci-
sive authority of Mr. De la Beche.

Speaking of his own estate, he says, " During crop time,
" which generally lasts about four months, |1 the negroes are

* Ibid. 139. t Ibid. 328. | Ibid. 323. § Ibid. 339.

II This should have been about Jive, unless the other planters I have
to cite, are mistaken, or there is something peculiar on his estate.

140 Of the Excess of forced Labour

" in consequence of being but comparatively few on this
" estate, divided into two spells, which relieve each other
" every twelve hours, viz. at noon and at midnight ; thus al-
" lowing half the night for work, and half for rest, during five
'* days in the week ; the whole of the remaining two nights,
" those of Saturday and Sunday, being their own hi/ laiv."*
(I doubt not he might have added by practice, too, on his oivn
estate, at least while he was there). In another place, he
says, " On sugar estates, where the negroes are numerous, in
" proportion to the land cultivated, the people are divided
" into three and four spells during crop-time : on properties
" where the numbers are not so great, into two."'!'

Here, then, we have a clear admission that the case now is
no better, if not worse, than it was forty years ago ; even on
the estate of this liberal and benevolent planter. Even his
slaves work eighteen hours out of the twenty-four in crop
time ; and though he says they have the remainder for rest,
he cannot mean, and I am sure did not desire to be understood,
that they have six hoursybr sleep, before the renewal of their
daily toil ; for the twelve hours which he regards as the night,
comprise the whole interval between their evening dismission
from field-work, and the morning muster ; and this, even if
we should assign to both the hour of six, which I have shewn
to be inconsistent with the most favourable colonial evidence,
more especially during the summer solstice, to which the crop-
months chiefly belong. Supposing, however, that the slaves
who are dismissed from the field at six, and take then their
six hours' spell at nightwork till midnight, are not mustered
in the field till six the next morning, they obviously cannot
have six hours intermediate rest, in any proper sense of
that word ; as they have their supper to prepare, and the
other ordinary and necessary functions of the evening to
perform, and to walk to the morning rendezvous in the field,
after their brief slumber has been disturbed by the rousing
bell-t

* Notes on the present condition of the slaves in Jamaica, p. 7.
t Ibid. 22.

I A new parliamentary document has, while I am revising these sheets for
the printer, for the first time met my eye. It is entitled, " Protector of

in point of Time. 141

Ft has been alleged, as an extenuation of these oppressive
hardships, that the more weakly slaves are commonly ex-

Slaves Reports," and is printed by an order of the House of Commons
of June 12th, 1829 ; and as it incidentally throws much light on this sub-
ject of nocturnal labour in crop-time, I will insert some extracts from it
here.

Some limitation to that branch of oppression had been prescribed by one
of the ordinances, that of September, 1826, emanating from the local au-
thorities at Berbice, but under the positive direction of the crown, which
has legislative power in that colony. It fixed, as the Protector observes
(p. 17), no express limit to any other than field labour, and work on
Saturday night, which is directed to end at ten o'clock. The Protector,
however, supposed, that by the spirit and general intention of the ordi-
nance, the same limitation ought to be extended to the other days of the
week ; and finding the practice to be as often as planters thought fit, to
work their slaves by spells through the night, without any remission of
their daily labours either before or aftei", he submitted the point to the
opinion of the fiscal, and king's advocate, the crown lawyers of the
colony.

From the former he received in answer a very planter-like and argu-
mentative opinion as to the necessities or convenience of the case; but no
clear or consistent solution of the question arising on the ordinance in
point of law; though he says, " The law of nature 7'equl?es u cessation
" fioin labow at night after the toil of the day."

The King's Advocate, Mr. Dalij, spoke more directly and satisfactorily ;
saying that, " as the ordinance regulated the time for field-labour to be
" from six o'clock in the morning till six o'clock in the evening, it was
" never contemplated by its framers that the same slave should perform
" his daily work in the field, and still be liable to labour during the night."

The question immediately arose from the complaints of four female
slaves to the protector, that after having been employed in cutting canes
in the field during the day, they were, about nine o'clock at night, after
they had gone to bed, called up to go and carry magoss from the mill ;
that they were employed at that work all the night until ten o'clock the
next day, when they had no " tie tie " (ligatures made from the cane trash
to tie up the bundles of magoss) left to take the magoss from the mill ;
that they were then employed to put magoss into the sun to dry for the
firemen. That about five o'clock in the evening (i, e. of the second day),
they went into the field to get the tie tie, and brought it home. That they
then went to the manager, and told him thei/ ivere weary, and he answered,
" Well, when the other people break off, you can go home." What that
time was is not stated ; but it may be collected from the rest of the case,
not sooner than twelve at niglit. The next morning they begged the
manager to let them have thri'e additional hands to take away the magoss in

142 Of' the Excess of forced Labour

empted from the night-work. But granting this, what does
it prove ? Only that the extremity of watching and toil attend-

the mill-house, " but he said no, and told them to go and cut canes in the
field."

Such applications to the manager from the poor wearied females, who
had had by their account, not more than three hours rest in thirty-six,
may seem no great offence ; but for this they were not only deprived of
their Christmas holidays, a severe punishment to the slaves, but kept in
solitari/ confinement in the dungeon, or clarkliouse, with both, feet in the stocks
for four days and nights. This complaint was in part denied by the mana-
ger; but only as to the point of the women having been called up the first
night at nine o'clock. lie merely alleged they were not called till twelve.
The following is his whole defence : —

" Alexander M'Donald, manager of Plantation Smithson's Place, having
" heard the complaint of the slaves, Bella, Emma, Acconba, and Sybella,
''denies the accusation against him for being called up at jijwe o'clock to
*' carry magoss from the mill on the night of the 1 8th December last ; and
" v)ith regard to their complaint of being in the stocks during the time
" they wei-e in confinement at the holidays, says, he conceives it to be in ac-
" cordance with the regulations, and that he had the power to do it," p. 20.

He called three witnesses, his overseer and two slaves, who stated that it
was the turn of those women to take a spell, and that it was at twelve o'clock
not nine when they were called up. (Same page.)

Here we find that there was no pretence of more than two spells. The
women had to take their nightly turn at the mill from twelve o'clock at
least, though not from nine, without any relief from the field-work of the
preceding or the following day ; and were denied any rest on the evening
of the last, till relieved at midnight by the other alternate spell with the
rest of the gang.

But the examination of Sandy, the head boiler, one of the defendant's
witnesses, is well worth a further extract.

Q. " When people work at the mill from the time it goes about at the
" hours you have mentioned, (viz. sometimes at twelve at night, sometimes
" at ten or eleven) until daylight the next morning, what becomes of them
' afterwards? Do they go to work all next day, or do they break off and go
" to sleep?"

A. " J'hey never break off; they go on working all the next day."

Q. " What are the hours for boiling sugar on Plantation Smithson's
" Place."

A. " We begin about four o'clock in tlie morning, and keep at it till
" eight at night ; we then go to sleep, and I have to get up at eleven to
" see them pot sugar. This takes about two hours." (Here the witness
apparently speaks of the boilers only.)

Q. " Do you go to sleep after this till four o'clock."

A " No. I have to see the coppers cleaned."

in point of Time. 143

ing it are found to be such as the feeble cannot possibly endure.
It is admitted that there is very commonly a want of hands to
alleviate the general pressure by forming an adequate number
of spells or reliefs. It would, therefore, be to wrong the under-
standings, and even further to impeach the humanity of the
planters, if we supposed that they would have only two spells
or reliefs, instead of three, or three instead of four, at the night
work, thereby subjecting their slaves so much oftener in the
week, to such long continued watching and labour, if they
could avoid it by employing a greater portion of their gangs
capable of such arduous service.

Q. " Do the other sugar boilers keep the same hours, or is it only the
" head boiler that is required to see the sugar potted ?"

A. "The other boilers are called up at the same time; but their duty is
"to clean the coppers." (p. 20, 21.)

Thus it appears that the boilers have not more than three hours' rest, or
rather three hours of respite, in the twenty-four ; and another of the defend-
ant's witnesses shew that the potters fare no better.

Q. " What sort of people are the sugar potters ? I mean how old are
" they."

A. " I cannot say exactly how old they are. They are young Creoles,
" both boys and girls.''

Q. " How long were these young Creoles employed to pot sugar on the
" night you speak of."

A. "They continued potting about three in the morning, when they went
"home to sleep." (p. 20.)

Such is the practice of night-work and day-work during crop in this
colony.

Mr. M'Queen had the effrontery to assert, in 1825, that the former had
been in general abolished. " Formerly it was a general custom during crop
"to make sugar during the night. It is still in some places the practice, &c.
" In a very short time night-work would be altogether unknown in the co-
"lonies, were the planters left alone," &c. (p. 261, 2.)

The reader, I hope, will remember that the same statements were made
to Parliament forty years ago, yet by this latest official document on the
subject, the practice appears to continue in rather more than the former
degree of rigour, even in a colony where there was a legislative ordinance,
by the plain intent of which night-work was prohibited.

The Plantation Smithson's Place, was not the only one from which com-
plaints were brought to the Protector ; but he found it in vain to prosecute,
even for the cruel treatment of the poor women on that estate. " I have
forborne," he says, in his report to the Governor, " to press this matter in
" the shape of a prosecution; being apprehensive of failure," (p. 18.) no un-
reasonable apprehension, certainly, as those who read the Fiscal's opinion,
will admit.

144 Of the Excess of forced Laliouv

The apologists of night-work, nevertheless, are fond of
telling us that only a small part of the gang is employed in it ;
and Barclay's work, in its usual spirit, diminishes the number
from between twenty and thirty, which was stated both by Mr.
Athill and Mr. Campbell as its ordinary amount, to eighteen.
It is added, that such was the proportion on an estate with
two hundred labourers; evidently with an aim to convey the
idea of there being so many effective workmen, though with
an explanation, doubtless in reserve, that negroes or slaves were
meant.* The inuendo to unwary European readers, is that
the hardship is imposed but on a few of the many who are able
to sustain it ; whereas West Indians well know that in a gang
of all ages, scarcely one third, deducting the drivers, trades-
men, and artificers, are strong enough for the heavier labours
of the plantation, including the night-work in crop-time.
With the same deceptious view, it is left unnoticed, that the
eighteen or twenty-five in constant employ at the boiling-
house, must be multiplied by the number of spells, in order to
find the true amount of the labourers to whom night-work is
assigned. Now the same author or authors, in an elaborate
attempt to refute the Rev. Mr. Cooper, contend for the use in
one instance at least, of four spells -f- ; supposing which, slaves
employed on night-work would, on their own deceptious enu-
meration be seventy-two; on the true one, about one hundred;
and even the smaller number might be enough to prevent the
exemption of one man or woman on the estate capable of sus-
taining the work. ;|;

Let it not be supposed, however, that the exposure of these
fallacies is at all necessary to support my strictures on night-
work. If the numbers coerced to its performance, were less

* Barclay, p. 416. f Ibid. 414-15.

X See the citation from Mr. de la Beche, supra, p. 139, 140. That gentle-
man had two hundred and eight slaves on his estate, as appears by the public
returns; yet he fairly ack no wleges his inability to muster more than two
spells. If the curious attempt to refute Mr. Cooper above referred to, is
thought to be founded in truth, we may see in it, that Mr. de la B. was im-
posed on, and /low, in his own belief that four spells were in use on some
other estates. They count double, it would appear, in Jamaica; making two
spells amount to four. See the passage.

in point of Time. 145

than they miglit be, so much the more inexcusable would be
the practice. If the numbers could be doubled, then instead
of six hours watching and work by night, after the hard la-
bours of the day, which even Mr. Barclay admits to be their
lot thrice in the week, three hours would suffice.

" The attendance of the spells, says Dr. Collins, should
*' never be so far prolonged as to disallow of their taking a
" few hours' rest every night ; as they can ill bear a long priva-
" tion of sleep ; and under such circumstances will doze at
" the mill or coppers, to the great danger of their fingers, if
" not of their lives. As to the weaker negroes, they should
** never do any night-work ; and in order to reconcile the
" others on whom the labour will fall, to such an indulgence,
" which will appear unjust and partial, you must make it up
" to them in one way or other ; either by suffering them to
" remain in their houses later in the morning, or by some
" addition of food, or if that be not wanted, by extraordinary
" clothing, which will in general go a great way towards
" the satisfying them.* It is impossible to suppose, after
reading such advice from this long-experienced planter, that
exemptions of slaves in the great, or strong gangs, or of any
but the very weakly, were usually made under the ordinary
practice, t

* Practical Rules, &c. p. 184-5.

f That boys and girls are not generally exempted from these nocturnal
duties, may appear from one of the descriptive passages of that new
champion of the planters before noticed, who has assumed the guise of a
novelist, (Marly, p. 39.) His hero is kept awake in his bed through the
night by the various noises incident to the brisk labours of the adjoining
boiling-house, and among them is enumerated " the squalling of near a
" dozen of girls and boys, who were seated on the shafts of the gin, forcing
" on the mules that turned the mill." These drivers are wholly omitted in
Mr. Barclay's enumeration.

Here let me quote again the pamphlet of Mr. Dwarris. " It should
*' not escape attention," he says, " when speaking of the labour exacted
" in crop-time (constantly dwelt upon by the abolitionists as oppressive
" on account of its uncertain [he should have said euormoits^ duration),
" that, as windmills are commonly used in the islands, there will ne-
" cessarily be many days when the mill cannot work, for an unan-

VOL. II. L

146 Of the Excess oj forced Labour

Mr. De la Beche, while he admits, as we have seen, the
severity of labour in crop-time, attempts to excuse the prac-
tice, as all other colonial writers, with a striking uniformity-
have done, by observing that the negroes are the best satisfied,
and he might have added, like the rest, the healthiest also,
at that season. He further informs us, that the negroes on
pens and coffee properties, where they have no night-work,
and no cane-holes to dig, and where it may be generally
stated that the labour is lighter, consider themselves less for-
tunate than those on sugar-estates, because the negroes seem to
enjoy crop-time ; '* at least," he adds, '^ they are decidedly
more merry then, than at any other period, except Christ-
mas."*

I am far from questioning the facts of this defence, or even
the respectable author's candour in the use he makes of them ;
for he had been only a year in the West Indies, and then, as
it would appear, only in Jamaica, where I believe the slaves
are, in general, better fed out of crop-time, than in most of
the other colonies. But there probably was not one among

" swerable reason, because there is no wind.'' — The West India Question,
p. 17, 18.

Does this gentleman, then, mean us to understand, that planters who
have windmills, have not in general cattle-mills also, to be worked by
mules or horses, when the former, for want of sufficient wind, or accidents,
cannot be used ? That would be often to hazard the partial loss or dete-
rioration of their ripened crops ; and is an improvidence, of which I
believe there are few, if any examples. To have cattle-mills without a wind-
mill, is a very common, nay, the most ordinary case in the Leeward Islands ;
but the converse of it, is one which, though I was for eleven years resident
there, I cannot recollect an instance of; and I well remember that the
common-place economical argument against being at the charge of erecting
a windmill, of which a great majority of the estates in the Leeward Islands
are destitute, was, that though it would save much cattle labour, and con-
sequent loss of live stock, it could not relieve the planter from the ne-
cessity of keeping a competent number of mules or horses, as a safeguard
to his crop, when calms or light winds prevailed.

Were there not this latent fallacy in Mr. Dwarris's " unansiveruble^
argument, it would still shew how hard-driven he was for some extenua-
tion of the practice. To what would it amount, but that planters abate
some small part of the hard drudgery of their slaves, when physical necessity
compels them to do so ? I believe it, — and I believe no more.

* Notes, &c. p. 8.21.22.

in poinl of Time. 147

the many long-experienced planters examined before parlia-
ment or the privy conncil, who carefully added the facts of
superior content, cheerfulness, and health in crop-time, to
their admission of its severe labours, who was not conscious
of two explanations, that would destroy the whole effect of
that apology, one of which adds to the discredit of their general
system. The first is, that the crop-months are to the inhabit-
ants of the islands of all classes and colonies, the healthiest
part of the year, and that the rainy and hurricane seasons,
which begin after the crop, and terminate before its re-com-
mencement, are those in which the epidemical diseases so
frequently and fatally prevalent in that part of the world,
usually occur. Diseases of debility, especially, which ill-
fed slaves are naturally very liable to, prevail most at that
season ; and it is then, also, that they are most frequently ex-
posed to be chilled by the rains, which fall in torrents upon
them during theirlaboursin the fields, drenching them through
their flimsy garments in a minute, and most commonly when
they are heated and copiously perspiring from the effects of
their exertions ; for it may be added, that this is also the
chief time of the holing process, the severest species of their
work.

The other and more important explanation, is one that the
reader will be better able to appreciate when I have given an
account of the general practice in regard to food ; but he will,
perhaps, anticipate its nature, when possessed of a further
extract from Mr. De la Beche ; " if," he says, " the canes
" then, i. e. in crop-time, give them additional trouble, they
'' amply compensate themselves ; for they eat as many as they
'' phase, and drink as much hot and cold cane-juice as they think
" proper," 8ic.*

* All the witnesses I have above alluded to were not cautious enough to
withhold this latter explanation. I will not here anticipate the evidence I have
to adduce as to the great penury of food out of crop-time, and which will
make it highly credible, that the addition of a beverage so nutritious as
the juice of the cane, must produce very powerful effects ; counterpoising,
perhaps, in general, the debilitating tendency of the additional labour and
watching. Many planters, though they would not admit the inadequacy
of subsistence out of crop, thought it advantageous to their cause to take

l2

148 Of the Excess of forced Labour

But let us enquire what the additional time of labour in
crop-time actually is.

To suppose that the plantations in Jamaica, and the other
colonies collectively, are so well supplied with slaves, that
the number of spells they can conniionly afford is three, will
be felt, after the remarks and evidence I have offered, to be
more than sufficiently liberal. I doubt not it would be very
far beyond the truth. Mr. Barclay'syb//r spells will be found
on comparison, to correspond exactly with what Mr. De
la Beche admits to be but two. But I will suppose three spells,
for the sake of avoiding all disputable or disputed pre-
mises, and taking every thing of that kind at the lowest. I will
also suppose that the law as to the exceptions on the nights of
Saturday and Sunday, is (very contrary to what anti-slavery
writers allege) fairly adhered to in general practice ; though we
have seen that even the Royal Ordinance at Berbice permits
working on Saturday night till ten. Still, after these ample
concessions, the result will be, that all the slaves employed in
night-work, during the crop, labour on an average, in that
season, above three hours and a half in the twenty-four, in ad-
dition to their ordinary day's work.

My calculation is this. From six in the evening, to six in
the morning, the time of night-work, is twelve hours, which
with the deduction of the nights of Saturday and Sunday, as
claimed by Mr. De la Beche, gives sixty hours per week ; and
the six hours from Friday at midnight, to six on Saturday
morning being added, the amount is sixty-six, which divided
by three, the supposed number of spells, gives twenty-two
hours weekly to each spell, or three hours and forty minutes,
per diem, during an entire working week of six days, in ad-
dition to the daily labour.

large credit for the restorative effects of tlie cane-juice during the boiling
season. But the following extract from the work, of their great champion,
Mr. Bryan Edwards, may here suffice: —

" The time of crop in the sugar-islands is the season of gladness and
" festivity to man and beast. So palatable, salutary, and nourishing is the
"juice of the cane, that every individual of the animal creation drinking
"freely of it, derives health and vigour from its use. The meagre and sickly
" among the negroes exhibit a surprising alteration a few weeks after the mill
" is set in action," he. — History of the West Indies, vol. ii. p. 221.

in point of Time. 149

To find the amount of this augmentation on an average
of work throughout the year, we must next ascertain the or-
dinary length of the crop-season.

The Jamaica witnesses we have seen, made it five months ;
and Mr. Bryan Edwards seems to fully confirm that estimate,
for he says, " the canes should be ripe for the mill in the be-
" ginning of the year, so as to enable the planter to finish his
" crop by the latter end of May, except as to the canes that
" are left to furnish cuttings or tops for planting." I am
not aware that any writer or witness except Mr. De la Beche,
has reduced the number of crop-months to "about four;"
while it is stated by other authorities, often to extend to six.
Mr. Gilbert Franklin for instance, stated in his evidence before
the committee of the House of Commons, that " the crop of
** sugar commonly begins from the 1st of January or February,
** and continues till the beginning of June or July, according
" as the estate is slaved ;" and Mr. Campbell says, that ** If
" the estate is weakly handed, the crop must be begun as
" early as the beginning of January, and continued till June
" or July."

*' Crop-time," (says Mr. M 'Queen) " extends from December
*' till May ;" and even Mr. Barclay expressly admits, that
" the crop- season lasts about five months," (p. 417.) He
adds, indeed, what no other writer has alleged, that there
are necessary intermissions of a week to put in the cane plants.
If so, it shews that there are no hands to spare from the
spells while the boiling process goes on.

It will not, I presume, be thought, on comparison of these
authorities, too large an estimate, if I take the crop-months
as comprising in a general view, about five of the twelve;
and if we spread the additional labour of three hours
and forty minutes during that season over the whole year,
the result will be an addition of more than an hour and a half,
on a yearly average, to the fifteen hours that we have taken
as the time of labour, or active exertion, out of the crop-sea-
son ; making altogether about sixteen hours and a half in
every twenty-four hours throughout the year ; with the excep-
tions only, such as they are, of the Sundays, and two or three
annual holidays.

150 Of the Excess of forced Labour

To make the account clearer, I will recapitulate the diffe-
rent items, and place them in one connected view.

Hours. Minutes.

Time of labour out of crop, as limited by the
Colonial Acts, and admitted to be the
usage, from five in the morning till seven
at night, deducting the two hours and a
half for breakfast and dinner 11 30

Half of the two hours' interval at noon, employ-
ed in work on the negro gardens or provision
grounds, &c., including walks to and from
the field 1

Mornings and evenings active employments
before and after field-work, for the master
or themselves, including going to and re-
turning from the huts, estimated together
at three hours, but taken at 2 30

Annual average of the extra nocturnal work

in crop-time 1 40

16 40

On the strictest review of this account, I can find no error
in it on the aggravatory, but several on the extenuatory side.
I have supposed one-half of the noontide respite to be time
of absolute rest, and without even distinguishing the grass-
picking colonies, where it affords no rest at all. In the crop-
time, I have allowed nothing for the slave's own occupations
after his dismission from the works at midnight, or six in the
morning ; and where the spells are but two, certainly the
more ordinary cases, my computation of night-work is short
by one-third of the truth. Indeed, it is much more deficient
if Mr. Barclay, and the evidence on oath cited by him (p. 415.),
are correct; for they state, that even with four spells, each
negro has 18 hours of night-work every week; and I have
taken it as amounting, with three spells, only to 22 hours.

I doubt not the fact to be, that the slaves have not in
general so much rest in crop-time as five hours in the twenty-
four.

That the work is at least eighteen hours during that season,

/// point of Time. 151

I am now enabled to shew, from recent and express authority;
and such as may suffice, perhaps, to satisfy those who will not
take the trouble of following me closely through the details
here given and demonstrated, for clearer views of the sub-
ject.

Should any man, after all the evidence I have already
offered, doubt whether the enormous amount of eighteen
hours' of diurnal labour, between the tropics, is not more than
avarice armed with irresistible power can impose, or patient
human nature, during five successive months sustain, let
him enquire for the Parliamentary papers before referred to,
entitled " Trinidad Negroes," and printed by order of the
House of Commons of the 14th of June, 1827, and he will
find in it, (p. 33.), the following passage. " I feel called
" on to explain more fully than I did, the opinion I gave as
" to whether sugar-estates could be carried on entirely by
" free labour; I do not think they could, in the manner the
" work is carried on at present, making large quantities of sugar
" in a given time; in many instances working eighteen hours
" OUT OF TWENTY-FOUR ; wMcJi constaut labouT the free settlev
" will not submit to, &;c. I have no doubt sugar-estates, carry-
" ing on labour from sun-rise to sun-set, might be worked by
" them;'&;c*

Whose is this statement? not that of an anti-slavery writer,
but of Mr. Mitchell of Trinidad, superintendent of the freene-

* See the Parliamentary paper referred tp, p. 33.

Nothing to this effect was said by him in his original examination ; unless,
which seems more probable, it was suppressed by the honourable Board, as
not fit for its purpose. But the superintendant, it appears, had been ex-
amined at a former period, about eighteen months before, if the dates are
correctly printed; and having then given an opinion, with which we are not
furnished, as to the impracticability of substituting free labour for slavery,
he thouglit it incumbent on him, it appears, to send, the next day, a letter to
the governor, with this explanation of his evidence, as stated in the minutes;
and the governor now laid it before the Board. Upon this Mr. Mitchell
was called in again, and subjected to a cross-examination by his brother
planters, the course of which marks the anxious desire of the honourable
members to obtain some qualification of the awkward explanatory state-
ment ; and marks also, the natural effect on the nerves of a witness, placed
in a perilous dilemma between regard to truth and consistency on the one
hand, and fear of being treated as an enemy to the common cause on the

152 Of the Excess of forced Labour

groes called American refugees, but a long-resident proprietor of
a suo-ar-estate worked by his own slaves in that island ; and be,
it well observed, a witness called and examined on the spot, by
a committee of the Insular Council, for the purpose of excus-
ing slavery, and opposing the humane orders of His Majesty's

other. With all his too natural dread of offence, the witness could only be
brought to qualify the terms of his letter as follows : —

Q. " You stated in the same letter to the governor, that slaves on sugar-
" estates worked, in many instances, eighteen hours out of the twenty-four.
" Do you mean in these cases, to allude to the whole gang on the estate,
" and to every day throughout the year ?"

A. " I mean only in time of crop, and the people employed at the mill
" and works."

Q. " Is it a general custom in your quarter, on estates, to make the mill
" and boiling-house gang work in crop-time, eighteen hours out of the
" twenty-four ?"

A. " I do not think it is the custom at present, but I think it was three
" years ago."

Q. " Do you know from your own observation, that this was the
" case."

A. " I have been told so."

If the reader will compare this, with the extract I have given of his letter
to the governor, he will agree with me, that the honourable examiners had
better have left the matter where it stood.

It was a miserable expedient to soften down into matter of opinion and
information, the positive assertion in his explanatory letter; and into by-gone
oppression, what had been expressly stated as \\\e present practice. Had it
been otherwise, indeed, the explanation would have been useless and irrele-
vant. But when it is added, that the witness had been twenty-two years a
planter, that he was and had been resident eighteen years on his estate, in
the quarter of North Naparima, of which he was also the commandant and
sole magistrate, (see p. 2 and 35), and pre-eminently bound, besides, as
superintendant of free negroes, to be accurate on such a subject, this sub-
terfuge to get rid of a palpable and notorious truth, well known not only
to the witness, but to every gentleman who heard him, must astonish every
man not so well acquainted as I am with the ordinary style of West India
evidence on this subject.

Had there been the slightest doubt on the point, or any colour for sug-
gesting a departure from the general practice in Trinidad, the witness would
not have been let off so easily ; and many planters would have eagerly come
forward to contradict the statement in his letter, or to prove that the oppres-
sion had ceased to be in use ; but though many other planters were ex-
amined, no other statement by, or question on the subject to, any other
witness, is to be found throughout those long examinations.

in point of Time. 1 53

Government. The general tenor of his evidence will shew to
those who read it, that the planters who called him were
not mistaken in supposing him a good friend to their cause ;
which was indeed also his own.

If there were nothing worse in slavery than this cruel and
murderous oppression of forcing men and women to work
hard in a hot climate eighteen hours in the twenty-four,
surely this would be enough for its condemnation by every
mind in which West Indian prejudices have not obtunded
the natural feelings of humanity and justice towards their
degraded objects.

I might enhance this general account of slave labour, by
adding to its diurnal excess the amount of the time sub-
ducted by laborious occupations from the rest of the Sabbath.
But this is one of the topics which I have declined to enter
upon, it having as a substantive article of oppression, and as pre-
cluding the religious instruction of the slaves, been sufficiently
discussed by other writers on the anti-slavery side. My
readers, however, will not forget that the poor beings so merci-
fully overworked during six days in the week, have but a very
partial rest at best on the seventh. But without taking this
aggravation into the account, I have sufficiently demonstrated,
as I undertook in the present chapter to do, that slave labour
is cruelly excessive in point of time.

The general lesult of data wholly established by the
evidence of my opponents, and of the calculations from them
here submitted, is this, that the poor slaves have eighteen
hours at the least, of coerced labour in every twenty-four,
during the crop-season, and during the whole year on an
average, above sixteen hours and a half. Unless the fairness
can be denied of adding to the labour in gang under the
drivers, solitary work, or laborious employments, directly or
indirectly for the master's profit, or necessary for the supply
of the slave's own personal wants, more than the estimate
that I undertook to sustain, has been proved. Mr. Ramsay,
forty years ago, averaged the labour at sixteen hours ; and I
have shewn its true present amount, after every fairly de-
mandable allowance, to be above sixteen hours and a half.

My readers I trust will not censure the large demand 1
have made on their patience, in this very important division

154 Of the Excess uf forced Labour

of my subject. To establish conclusively the true ordinary
amount of forced labour in point of time, was to fix a datum
of pre-eminent value, with every man, who wishes to form
a right judgment, either on the actual state of slavery, or on
the credit that fairly belongs to colonial witnesses and writers
as to the facts they allege in its defence. We have in it, a
criterion simple, homogeneous, and intelligible alike in every
region of the globe. Nor are we embarrassed in its apphca-
tion, by diversities real or alleged between places, persons, or
times ; for, however the treatment of the slaves may vary in
different sugar colonies, and under masters of different de-
scriptions, their time of daily labour, in all those colonies, or
all from which we have any public evidence on the sub-
ject, will be found, when that evidence is fairly scrutinized
to be very nearly, if not exactly the same. Nor is it al-
leged that in this respect, the practice of the more hu-
mane, differs very materially from that of the more rigorous
planter. I recollect at least no such distinctions more
important, than the giving or not giving a day, or half a
day weekly, out of the crop-season to the slaves, in aid of the
sabbath, for the culture of their own provision grounds.

The result of these investigations is much enhanced in its
importance, because it shews the utter futility of all the
charges of indolence against the much calumniated African
race, that are founded on a comparison between the effects of
their industry when free, and the products of their forced
labour when slaves.

This is now the favorite theme of the planters and their
controversial advocates. It is on this they mainly rely for
averting all measures tending either to general or progressive
enfranchisement. On this ground, they had the confidence
to oppose at the Privy Council table, even the giving a right
of self-redemption, to such slaves as might be industrious and
fortunate enough, to be able to tender their full value as pro-
perty, for the purchase of their freedom.

Ye be idle, ye be idle, was the answer of Pharaoh to the
oppressed Israelites, when complaining of their heavy drudgery.
** They are idle, they are idle," is now the cry of far worse than
Egyptian masters ; and for the same odious purpose, the ex-
acting by means of an unjust slavery, a merciless excess of

in point of Time. 155

work. The special requisitions of God in the one case were
resisted ; his sacred laws in the other, are set at nought, by
the same false and insulting pretence. The Egyptian crite-
rion of idleness, was the not gathering straw to make bricks.
The West Indian, is far more rigorous ; it is unwillingness to
work hard by day and by night, during sixteen or eighteen
hours in the twenty-four.

If idleness may be justly defined to be the want of due ex-
ertion, we must fix the right standard of the latter, before we
can fairly predicate idleness of exertions less in degree. But
the colonists take a more convenient course. They are too
prudent to tell us expressly how many hours daily they think
a free man ought to work between the tropics ; because if less
than the labour they inforce on their slaves, their estimate would
be self-condemnation ; and if equal to it, might startle even the
least considerate and humane ; and suggest views of their prac-
tical standard, very different from those they desire to impress.
They deem it better, therefore, to infer a want, of industry
from the productive effects of free labour, than from its posi-
tive or comparative amount. The Haytians are idle, be-
cause they do not raise so much agricultural produce, as an
equal number of slaves ; and cannot at all compete in sugar
planting for exportation, with the slave masters of Jamaica, or
Cuba. The free negroes in our own colonies, are idle be-
cause they do not improve their condition by labouring
in the cane-pieces in competition with the forced labour of
slaves. Such reasoning obviously amounts to a tacit as-
sumption of the whole matter in dispute. It assumes, thai
the exaction of labour from the slaves, is not excessive ; and
that the returns given for it in subsistence, are liberal or
equitable enough to equal the reasonable expectations, or at
least the potential earnings in other lines of industry, of
freemen working in the same degree for hire. As the case really
stands, it would be just as rational to chargeone of our own pea-
sants with idleness, because his work does not equal in its effects
that of a horse, or produce to him in wages what his employer
earns by the use of his quadruped competitor.

There is one very elaborate defence of slavery, in which
reasoning less sophistical on this subject, might naturally be
expected. I mean the reports of Major Moody, which I have

156 Of' the Excess of forced Labour

before cited and described.* Their main object is to defend
the colonial system, on the principle that slavery is necessary
for the culture of the sugar colonies ; because free negroes
cannot be induced to submit to that degree of labour, or in
his own favourite phrase, that ** stead)/ industry to which the
slaves are compelled.

To maintain and illustrate this doctrine, the Major brings
forward numberless facts, alleged to be derived from his own
observation and experience, not only in the West Indies, but
other tropical regions, all designed to shew the want of ade-
quate exertion, or " steady industry," in blacks or coloured
persons of free condition ; and in his anxious depreciation of
their industry, the time of their work is a measure of exertion
to which he very commonly resorts. The very first datum there-
fore to be fixed by him for the purpose of his comparison with
slave labour, obviously should have been the ordinary time of
the latter ; but his readers will be more successful in their
researches than I have been, if they find that essential datum
expressly supplied in any part of those folio volumes.

There isan endless iteration in various forms and details, both
of statements and reasonings, tending to shew the value of one
of his terms of comparison ; but that of the other is no where
that I can find expressly given ; and there are many places
in which it must apparently have cost the Major much trouble
to avoid committing himself by some clear, or at least intelli-
gible, statement on that subject.

This cannot but be thought exceedingly strange ; more es-
pecially when it is added, that Major Moody affects to treat
of slave labour systematically, and to write with the precision
of a philosopher; in the developement of what he seems to re-
gard as a new science ; or a new branch at least of political
economy, discovered by himself, which he calls the ''philosophy
of labour " The defect will be thought the more extraordinary,
because he is perpetually taxing his antagonists, the irapugners

* Supra, note on p. 48, 49. Let me here correct an error in that note,
which is already printed. The colony, I now understand, in which the
Major was long and extensively engaged as a planter, was not Demerara,
but Berbice.

in point of Time. 157

of negro slavery, with want of accuracy and precision in their
premises of fact, and in their views and reasonings on this
very same subject ; and boasting of the great experience, and
close investigation, that have enabled him to correct our
errors. How surprising then that by leaving the ordinary
time of slave labour undefined, he should have left out one
of the first elements of his own calculations ; the very corner-
stone of his entire system ! ! It is as if Euclid had proceeded
to compare right angles with other angles, without first shew-
ing what a right angle is ; or as if a writer on the rural econo-
my of this country should undertake to demonstrate from his
own experience, the superior advantages of one course of hus-
bandry in comparison with another, and to that end should
furnish us with numerous accounts and estimates as to the
expences and returns of the course he disapproves ; leaving
those of the course he recommends, altogether unstated.*

* The only passages I can find in Major Moody's Reports, in which he
possibly may be thought to have deviated from this strange course of pro-
ceeding, are in pages 5Q and 57 of the Second Part of his Report ; wherein
he attempts to demonstrate the impossibility of substituting free for forced
labour, on the assumptions that free negroes will not work more than is
necessary to obtain a mere subsistence, and that this can be obtained in a
given colony by working land on their own account half an hour, or at
most one hour per day. How then he argues are seven hours of further
labour to be obtained by the white capitalist for raising exportable articles,
without coercion? " It appears to me," he adds, " impossible to sup-
" pose, that any previous habits of labour, or any degree of moral instruc-
" lion, could ever have the effect of inducing any free negro, or Indian, to
" work eight hours in a day for another man, in return for ordinary wages
" in a country where the labourer could more easily obtain the same value
" in substance, by working for himself only half an hour,^' &c. Throughout
this part of his argument, he compares the assumed time of voluntary labour
with eight hours per diem only of labour by constraint.

Here then, the Major may be supposed to have furnished by clear impli-
cation in one place, what ought to have been found by direct averment, or
avowed assumption in a hundred, the important datum in question. He may
be thought to have committed himself like his coadjutor in the same cause,
Mr. M'Queen, as to the ordinary time of the slave's daily labour, and even
gone much beyond that writer's bold misrepresentation, by reducing his
maximum of nine hours, out of crop, to an average of eight hours at all
seasons.

But I will not, without strict necessity impute to this gentleman, who

158 Of the Excess of forced Labour

Having enabled my readers to supply this singular defect,
in the " philosophy of labour," for themselves, and to understand
v^rhat the planters mean by industry, I freely admit that such
industry is not to be found, nor any exertions that at all ap-
proximate to it, among negroes, or any other men who are free.
If less than this is idleness, the latter I confess are idle, and
likely ever to remain so. 1 concur with the superintendent
of the American refugees, that " free labourers will not work
eighteen hours out of the twenty-four."* They will not work
with what the venerable Society for promoting Christian
Knowledge justly calls "the least possible intermission."f In
other words, they will not work themselves to death.

Nor will the disparity ever be small enough to allow of any
competition on commercial principles, between forced labour
and free. Strijce off eight hours per diem from the five months
of harvest, and six hours and a half from the annual average ;
reduce the labour to an average of ten hours in the twenty-
four, and cut off all those additions to it fraudulently dis-
guised in the case of men who receive neither wages nor food
from their masters, as time of rest, or of " work only for them-
selves ;" give truth in short to all the false pretences I have
refuted ; and it might still well be doubted, whether free men

challenges repeatedly implicit credit to his testimony, on the score not only
of his public duty as a commissioner, but on his military honour, that he
meant to convey an impression so grossly repugnant to what he well knew
to be the real fact of the case. He does not affirm, and could not of course mean
to insinuate, that the slaves work no more than eight hours a day ; though
certainly, those who read the passage may naturally enough so understand
him ; especially as it would have been diminishing the force of his own
economical views to reduce the slave labour to less than its true extent.

He certainly might have doubled the strength of his argument by comparing
the short labours ascribed by him to the free negroes and Indians, not with
eight hours, but sixteen hours a day ; and preserved the precision of the
philosopher together with the fidelity of a reporter, by stating the latter
expressly as the average labours of the slaves; but that the planters would
have been equally well satisfied with his official defence of their cause, is
more than I dare venture to affirm.

* Supra, p. 151. f Supra, 138.

in point of Time. 159

in equal numbers, would ever supply that long continuance
of human labour that would yet remain for the slave.

I firmly believe they would not ; because nine hours of
work per diem on an average of the year, is all that is yielded
by agricultural labourers in England ; because this is much
more than the utmost incentives to industry have ever ob-
tained from free-tillers of the soil in any tropical climate ;
and because I am strongly inclined to think that the hardiest
natives of the torrid zone cannot permanently sustain so
much, without such a noxious pressure on their physical
powers, as the self-conservatory instincts of nature imperiously
forbid.

The time of slave-labour, then, when shewn in its truly
enormous extent, is a sufficient answer to those who impute
indolence to free negroes, because they cannot sustain a com-
petition with it in the growth of sugar or other exportable
produce. But the defence will be found much stronger when
it shall be shewn with what extreme parsimony the slaves
are maintained. If they work twice as much as free-men
will or ought to do, it is, be it remembered, without wages ;
and the whole charge of their maintenance is, as I doubt not
clearly to prove, not equal to one-fifth part of the wages or other
means of support which a free-labourer may fairly demand,
and by moderate industry in working for his own benefit ob-
tain. In the grand article of human labour, therefore, the
Haytian would have to contend with the Jamaica sugar
planter, under a disparity of cost as ten to one. It is needless
to add to such a contrast, his want of a mother country to
bear almost all the charges of internal government in peace,
and defence in war, to raise the price of his produce in Europe
by monopolies and bounties, and to sustain him on every
emergency, even by the sacrifice of her own agriculture, and
her vital commercial interests, for his relief.

The dearth of free-labour for raising tropical produce is,
on these views, so far from furnishing any excuse for slavery,
that it is, in truth, one of the many baneful effects for which
that institution has to answer. It has reduced human labour
to so vile a price, as to shut out from agricultural employment
in the West Indies all but servile hands ; or confine the free
at least to such branches of it as contribute little to the ad-

160 Of the Excess ofjorced Labour in point of Time.

vancement of the societies they belong to, and less to the
commerce of Europe. The same course, as I shall shew, has
excluded, in a great measure, from the plantations, most per-
niciously to their soil, the use of working cattle, and those im-
plements by which human labour is every where else economised ,
and its produce greatly improved. Is it asked why most of
our old islands are exhausted, and their proprietors involved
in almost universal ruin ? I answer, mainly because they are
cursed with slavery ; and becajuse men who can be forced to
work, eighteen hours in the twenty-four, are in the views of
a short-sighted avarice, cheaper than horses and plows.

But further to explain these truths, and for purposes far
more important to humanity, I must now proceed to shew
what the nature of that labour is, which has such enormous
duration, and the barbarous means by which it is exacted.

161

CHAPTER V.

THE LABOUR SHEWN TO BE EXCESSIVE ALSO FOR THE
MOST PART IN POINT OF INTENSITY, OR THE DEGREE
OF ACTUAL EXERTION.

I HAVE already observed that the intensity of muscular ex-
ertion, cannot be measured, like its duration, by any general
scale or standard. When we wish to give any clear ideas of
it, either positive or comparative, we are obliged to resort to
the effect produced. The same, indeed, is the case in the
mensuration of mechanical energies ; as when to shew the ope-
rative force of a steam engine, we speak of a four-horse or a
ten-horse power : the known effect of the one, serves to mea-
sure and define the force of the other. So when we say, that
a man has carried so many stone weight, has walked or run
so many miles in a given time, or has threshed out in a day so
many bushels of corn, we may form just ideas, comparative
ones at least, of the easiness or intensity of his labours, be-
cause we know how much other men usually carry, or walk,
or thresh out, when they exert their strength in the same
modes of action. But when the descriptions of human labour
in question are not familiar to us, nor the effects produced by
them commensurable with any known standard, even this re-
sort is in great measure precluded.

It is evident, therefore, that in the present division of my
work, the same simple modes of demonstration that I have
resorted to in the preceding sections cannot have place. I
cannot establish or refute general propositions as to inten-
sity or ease, by computing and comparing the effect of par-
ticular admissions ; because neither the one nor the other have
any determinate or clearly definable meaning.

VOI-. II. M

162 Of the forced Labour of Slaves

Here, too, the restriction I have imposed on myself as to
evidence, is more than ever disadvantageous ; for when the
propositions in question turn on matter of opinion or judg-
ment, rather than mere fact^ it cannot be expected that the
case alleged on one side of the controversy, will often find
any direct support by testimony on the other. When my
antagonists state that the labour of the slaves in general is
lighter easy, or that a particular process is so, they evidently
involve matter of judgment with the tangible facts of the
case ; and yet I am precluded by my gratuitous pledge from
opposing to such assertions of those by whom the labour is
imposed, the judgment of anti-slavery writers.

These considerations entitle me the more, in this place, to
an attentive audience, while I endeavour by fair, though some-
times oblique, inferences from the hostile evidence I have to
grapple with, to enable my readers in some degree to judge
for themselves.

Here let me, in the first place, avail myself of the obvious
general probabilities of the case. Is it likely that those who
have carried the exaction of labour to the utmost extremes
in point of time, have been abstemious as to the degrees of im-
mediate exertion ? The same irresistible force that compels
a slave to watch and work eighteen hours out of the twenty-
four in crop-time, and sixteen or more on an average of
the year, might compel him as easily to exert himself during
the time of work to the full measure of his strength ; at least
while the driver is behind him : nor can any motive of for-
bearance be assigned in the one case, that would not apply
at least as forcibly in the other.

Is the assessor's motive self-interest? That undeniably is
best consulted by obtaining as much labour as possible in a
given time. I know of no principle in which the sugar
planters are more unanimous than that celerity in all their
operations, especially in taking off the crop, is essential to
their success. The great characteristic of bad management,
in their views, is the want of energy and despatch ; and the
standing excuse for it by managers, is the inequality of the
gang or the strength, as it is called, to the quantity of cane-
land under culture. Are we to suppose than that this defect,
when it occurs, arises from a humane desire to spare the slaves

in point of Inte.meness. 163

in point of muscular exertion while they are actually at work 1
That motive would rather dictate a reduction of the excessive
time of work, than an abatement of its energy ; and it is ma-
nifest that ccBteris paribus the one must be inversely as the
other. The question should be regarded as relating chiefly, if
not exclusively, to such work as is enforced by the driver's direct
coercion ; and to retrench the time so employed would ob-
viously be a much better, as well as more certain, alleviation,
than a proportionate diminution of briskness and energy in
the work itself, by giving to the slaves an earlier dismission,
and so much more time at their own disposal, either for re-
pose, or for those individual labours in their provision grounds,
in which they are the immediate arbiters of their own ex-
ertions.

My inference then is, that the now-established long dura-
tion of the work, furnishes a strong presumption of its gene-
ral intensity. As the incontestable practice is to take all
that nature can be made to yield in the one case, less is
not likely to be exacted in the other. The indiscriminate
mode of the coercion may indeed, and I shall hereafter prove
that it does, reduce the exertions, of the more robust slaves
somewhat below the maximum of what their hardy natures
might for a time at least afford ; and the feebler part of the
same gang, are pushed in an equal degree beyond what their
constitutions can lastingly endure; but the driving cannot
with any probability be supposed to be less urgent than what,
upon an average estimate, the gang is thought able generally
to sustain.

Here I must open progressively the different parts of
the case which I propose to prove ; and the statements in
this instance must be my own ; for I am not aware that
any one of my fellow-labourers has treated this part of
the case distinctly, and with due specifications. But
though I shall state nothing but what I certainly know to
be true, in respect at least of the Island of St. Christopher,
where I long resided, I desire no credit for any proposition as
mine. Let all that I allege be regarded like the statements
borrowed in a former chapter, from Mr. Ramsay, as the mere
speech of an advocate ; and go for nothing, except so far as I

M 2

1G4 Of the forced Labour of Slaves

shall be able to bring the facts home, by the testimony of my
opponents, to the conviction of impartial readers.

There are two ways in which labour may be too intense.
The muscular effort may be too strenuous, or the movements
too quick ; and, with the exception of hoUng the land, it is in
the latter way chiefly that the predial slaves, independently of
the oppressive duration of their labours, are over-worked in
the sugar colonies.*

" Holing" is the process of preparing land for the recep-
tion of the cane plants : for which purpose it is laid out in
rectilinear trenches of considerable depth, which are divided
into equal sections of about two feet square, and the work is
wholly performed by the hoe. Its difficulty consists chiefly
in the hard texture of the soil, trodden down in the labours of
the preceding crop, and baked by the heat of a tropical sun
during about nine months of an intervening fallow. The sur-
face is quite impenetrable by the spade, and equals in hard-

* It is but fair to notice, that in this part of my subject, I shall have to
correct sometimes not only the misrepresentations of opponents, but the
misconceptions of some who were sincere friends to the cause I sap-
port.

It is, as I before remarked, from domestic slavery, that strangers visiting
the West Indies, must generally derive their notions of the ordinary state and
treatment of negroes ; the predial class, to which my present investigations al-
most exclusively relate, being brought very little under their notice. To the
former, they may not unnaturally ascribe languor and indolence ; because, it
being a characteristic of Creole families to keep a superfluous number of do-
mestic slaves, they have for the most part very little to do. The field ne-
groes, also, may often be seen working with apparent langour. It is a
natural effect of their weariness after the long continued labours of the day ;
and it is in the evening chiefly that they are likely to be much under the
observations of white persons, whether strangers or residents, who are
not called by plantation duties to survey their labours in the cane pieces
during the heat of the day.

But the main source of honest errors on this subject, has been inattention
to the distinction above pointed out. Casting the hoe, and carrying loads,
are the chief general forms of labour ; but the former, in holing, the most
ordinary process, cannot be rapid, because the exertion is great ; and the
loads being for the most part not very heavy, the quickness of movements
lias not excited the attention it deserves ; though I shall prove it to be op-
pressively great.

in point of Intenseness. 165

ncss those soils to which our labourers apply the pick-axe.
The hoe, therefore, for effectual penetration, must be raised
above the workman's head, and brought down with a vigorous
stroke ; and it will be found that almost every colonial witness
or writer, who ascribes easiness to plantation labours in ge-
neral, admits this large branch of them to be severe.

One of these writers, indeed, when speaking of it, suggests
an ingenious extenuation ; but in doing so, indirectly confesses
that, to beholders at least, the work of holing is arduous
enough to excite compassion. *' When negroes become mas-
** ters of their work," he says, " as much may be done by
" sleight as labour; and a constant habitude makes that fa-
'* miliar, which, to a looker-on, would be considered as a haid-
*' ship under tohich both spirits and strength must soon siic-
" cumb."* That the planters deem the process of holing to
be not only in appearance, but in reality, severe labour, is
manifest, even from the apologies they offer for it ; such as
that the stronger negroes are those which are selected to form
what is called the holing gang ; and that they are very com-
monly sustained under that species of labour, by spirituous
liquor.

" Holing," said Mr. Campbell of Grenada, ** is the most
" severe work out of crop."t '' About the middle of Augiist,"
said the same witness, " many of the strongest of the gang
" (commonly about forty, more or less, according to their
" strength) go to holing the land necessary for the following
** crop."]: ** We often give them while holing," he states in
another place, " twice a day weak grog."

Mr. Baillie's account is to the same effect. — "I have al-
** ways considered the holing of land as the hardest labour
" on a plantation ; and that is generally the priiicipal jiart
" of the work out of crop season." " It is always done by
" the ablest of the gang, and the hohng of land generally
** commences in the month of August, and continues to the
" beginning of January." " The negroes employed in holing
" have generally a certain allowance of bread ; and very fre-
" quently spirits, mixed with water."§

* Beckford's Remarks upon the Situation of Negroes in Jamaica, p. 44.
t Commons' Report of 1790, p. 140. J Ibid. 139. § Ibid. 188.

166 Of the forced Labour of Slaves

" The stoutest and most able," advises Dr. Collins, " should
" work by themselves, without any regard being had to their
** sex, for though men are supposed to possess, and generally
" do possess, more strength than women, it is not universally
" so," &c. " To your ablest negroes, therefore, which is
" called the strong gang, may be assigned the rudest labour
" of the plantation, such as holing, stumping or hoe-plough'
" ing." " As this part of your gang," he adds, " is loaded
" with a harder service, it will be proper to distinguish them
" with greater indulgence. They must either have more
" time allotted to their own use, or you must give them some
" extraordinary food ; some biscuits, and grog, with or without
" molasses daily, or rather twice a day."*

That such should be the practice, and such the medical advice,
may seem strange to European minds. That bread and biscuit
are more than ordinary sustentation to hard-working slaves,
though strictly true, is more than I have yet enabled my readers
to conceive : and though a draught of ale or porter, we know,
may not only enliven and animate the labourer for the moment,
but serve to maintain his strength by its nourishing qualities ;
spirituous liquors can obviously promote the former purpose
alone ; and at> the probable expence of permanent health
and vigour. In the West Indies, copious perspiration
abridges no doubt the temporary influence, and is likely to
aggravate the ill effects of the subsequent revulsion. But
where the efforts to be excited are strenuous, and very trying
to the strength and spirits, such a short-lived stimulant may
be useful, at least as a substitute for that painful and more
enervating stimulant the cart-whip, by the effects of which the
vital current may be sometimes lessened, as well as the spirits
depressed. We might reasonably infer, therefore, from the
means used and recommended, the severity of the exertions
to be obtained. But I will not further multiply authorities
or reasonings on this point. When planters admit any species
of slave labour to be severe enough to be fit only for the more
robust, and to require extraordinary artificial support, it can-
not be doubted tp be intense, in a positive, as well as com-
parative view.

* Practical Rule^, &c. 176, 7.

/// point of I/Uensenes.s. 167

Other kinds of labour in the cane-pieces are severe, though
in a considerably less degree than holing ; and it is admitted,
even by Mr. Dwarris, that able and cautious apologist of the
system, that in a general view they are more toilsome than
those of the English peasant. " The field labour," he says,
** is truly represented as severe ; hut so is ploughing and hedging
" and ditching in England, though, I admit, 7iot quite in the
" same degree ; as agriculture here is in a state of' greater per-
"fection."*

The intensity of the labourof the slaves, in other cases, chiefly
consists in the celerity of movements, with which they are
compelled to perform it. In working under the drivers, not
in line, as in the holing process, but in file, as in carrying
out dung, or bringing canes to the mill, their motions, to
speak in military terms, are either in quick or double-quick
time.

Let me instance the operation of dunging, as it is called.
The usage is to carry out the manure in baskets into the cane-
pieces, which are often of very steep ascent, and to throw an
equal portion of it into each particular cane-hole. Some of
the colonial witnesses have alleged that it is previously brought
from the homestall as near to the cane-pieces as carts can
approach. If this were generally, and 1 am sure it is not,
or at least was not, universally true, the relief would be
but partial on many or most estates in the islands, that I
am best acquainted with ; for many of their more distant
cane-pieces are too highly and abruptly elevated to be easily
accessible by wheel-carriages. But to let this pass, it is at
least admitted that the slaves have much of this labour to
perform, and that the dung-baskets are universally carried
on their heads. Many planters also confess it to be a species
of labour comparatively, at least, severe.

'* The manure used in the West Indies," said Mr. Tobin,
" is not spread on the ground as it is in England, but is
*' carried and placed carefully round each plant separately, so
" that wheelbarrows or carts could not be used for that pur-
" pose after the canes are come up ; but the manure is gene-

West India Question, p. 17.

168 Of' the forced Labour of Slaves

" rally carried in carts, and made into heaps at proper dis-
" tances on the land before it is holed, in order to save as much
" labour as possible to the negroes,"*

Question to Mr. Willock of Anligua, — " What part of the
" cultivation of an estate do you conceive to be most laborious
" to a negro ?"

Answer. — " Throwing out dung in baskets."

Q. ** Describe the basket, the weight and the manner in
" which it is carried."

A. " To the best of my recollection, the basket with the
" dung does not weigh above twenty-five pounds."

Q. " When they are carrying this dung, do they do it with
" ease to themselves?"

A. " They always work very cheerfully on those occasions,
*'for I generally give them grog"f

The reader will perhaps wonder that carrying a weight of
twenty-five pounds, should be thought to require that the
bearer should be sustained or exhilarated, as in the holing
process, by spirituous liquors ; but my next quotation, which
pre-eminently deserves his attention, will probably lessen his
surprise.

Sir Ashton Warner Byam, a gentleman of deservedly high
estimation in the colonial circles, was called as a witness by
the West India petitioners ; and gave his testimony zealously
in their favour, as the readers of my former volume may re-
member.;!: He was a man of distinguished talents as a law-
yer, who had been Attorney General of the Leeward Islands,
and he was a proprietor and practical sugar planter in Grenada,
where he held, I think, the same professional office. A more
intelligent or respectable witness on both branches of the case,
the practice, as well as the law of slavery, could not be found
or desired by those on whose behalf he was called.

Sir Ashton was examined particularly by the Committee, as
to the practice of carrying out dung; and the following were
the questions and answers as they appear in the printed
Report.

* Common's Report of 1790, p. 267. f Ibid. 348.

J See Vol. I. p. 1-16.

in point of Intenseness. 169

Q. "Do you not apprehend that the work of holing the
" land for the canes, and of dunging the holes, is a labour
" which would be generally reckoned severe?"

A. " It is certainly the most laborious employment in the
** cultivation of the land ; and if it was constantly continued
" through the year, I should think it harder than I should
" wish to put negroes to."

Q. " Are you sufficiently acquainted with the detail of the
" plantation labour, to ascertain the weight of those baskets
" of dung which the negroes carry on those occasions?"

A. " The weight varies probably on different plantations,
" and must vary according to the state of the dung used,
" supposing the same baskets filled. I cannot speak with
" any certainty as to the number of pounds ; but the weight
" is so little inconvenient to the slaves, who carry that and
" all other burthens on the head, that it is a pretty general
" practice, as far as my observation has gone, for the slaves to
" run, or go in a quick pace, when they are carrying the dung."

Q. " Do you then mean to say, that the pace of slaves on
" these occasions is regulated by their own discretion, and
" not by that of the overseers or drivers ?"

A. *' I do not mean to say, that the slaves if left to themselves
" would constantly use that pace ; but conceive that the practice
" would not prevail among the drivers, if it was found severe or
" unreasonable."

Q. " Do you apprehend that that species of labour is what
" the negroes perform with as much willingness as their other
" common employments ?"

A. " I never heard them complain of it ; though I have no
" doubt if they were asked they would prefer weeding of canes
" or any lighter work."*

To the discerning reader, the style as well as the sub-
stance of this testimony will suggest very useful reflec-
tions ; and teach him what glosses he is to expect even
from very respectable men, when speaking or writing under
the strong influence of prejudice, of self-interest, and of rcr
gard to their own credit as planters, in the accounts they
give of this system. Had it not been for the cross question

* Commons' Report of 1790, p. 123-4.

1 70 Of the forced Labour of Slaves

as to the drivers' coercion, put by an abolitionist member of
the Committee, the very circumstance that constitutes the in-
tenseness of the work, would have seemed fair evidence of its
lightness ; and when the respectable witness was driven to
shew the fallacy of his own inference in that respect, he
shifted his ground we see, and resorted to one not less falla-
cious ; assuming that the drivers could and would moderate
the pace as reason and lenity required.

As to the general moderation of the driver's exactions and
discipline, the reader has already seen much, and shall see
more hereafter ; but that a practice which Sir Ashton himself
described as universal, and a departure from which must
obviously throw back the necessary business of the plant-
ation, depends on the discretion of those executive agents,
was a suggestion that I need not perhaps stop to refute. The
drivers are bad enough, as many of their employers have often
admitted, and still admit ; but however they may abuse the
discretionary powers they possess over individuals, the quan-
tity of work to be performed by the whole gang in a given
time, is not and cannot be in their arbitrement ; but in that
only of the proprietor or his manager, who calculates of course
on the degree of despatch that custom has established. The
driver, at his own peril, must see that the cane-piece is manured
within the time allowed for it ; and if the ordinary rapid pace
of the dung-carriers is necessary for that purpose, to this he
must obviously adhere, whether it is severe on the slaves or
not.

As to the slaves not being heard to complain, the ar-
gument could weigh with European ignorance alone. To
complain, even of extraordinary modes of oppression, and
which the owner may be supposed not to have authorized, is
a perilous experiment ; but to remonstrate against what cus-
tom has established as the ordinary duties of the gang, would
be regarded as mutiny, and punished not only by tlie cart-
whip, but perhaps even by the musket or the gibbet. My
opponents nevertheless often resort to such pleas, though they
are just as reasonable as it would be in a violator who had
gagged his victim, to infer her willingness, from her not calling
out for assistance. Sir Ashton we see, admitted that the
slaves would probably have expressed their dislike to thiw

in point of' Li tenseness. 171

labour if they had been enabled by a question safely to do so ;
and how indeed could he have said otherwise, after admitting
that the work was severe? Yet in what could its severity
consist, if the baskets as he represented were light, except in
the quickness of the pace? — But the question of severity
apart, we here have an admission which must be felt to
be conclusive, that in this species of labour at least, the
running, or going in a quick pace, with the burthens, is the
general practice.

In respect of the alleged hghtness of the load, the planters
have varied much from each other in their different accounts ;
and as it is truly alleged by the last cited witness, that there
must, from the nature of the case, be great varieties in its ac-
tual weight, I will not attempt to form any average estimate.
The briskness of the long continued motion would be enough,
even with the small weight of twenty-five pounds which Mr.
Willock incredibly assigned to the dung and basket, to make the
day's work extremely oppressive ; and that such was his view
is evident, since he considered it as the very hardest work of a
plantation. I will only add the following paragraph of advice
from Dr. Collins. " As seldom as possible should dung be
" removed when wet ; for in that state, to its own weight is
" superadded that of the water, perhaps equally great; and
" the negroes will be vexed by the drippings from their
" baskets. — In dry weather, and when the dung is dry, a
" a negro will carry twice as much of it, and with more ease
*' to himself than in other circumstances. At that time they
** may be required to fill their baskets, and they will be less
" harassed by the excess of weight than by the fatigue of
" walking."* In the experienced author's judgment then,
both are harassing ; and the latter is so, even when the
weight is not excessive.

We have now obtained another datum from which to
reason as to the probable intensity of slave labour in general.
I inferred it before from the oppressive exactions in point of
time ; and the admitted severity of forced labour in some of

* Practical Rules, p. 195.

172 Of the forced Labour of Slaves

its branches, strengthens the same inference as to the rest.
The common end being to obtain from a limited number of
slaves all the exertion they are capable of for the master's
profit, and it being established that he does not spare them
in point of time, nor as to one or two kinds of ordinary work
at least, in point of intensity, it is highly improbable that in
the other operations of the estate, their utmost potential efforts
in a given time are not fully exacted. Least of all is this
probable in the labours of the crop season ; when celerity of
operation is admitted to be of the utmost importance, both to
the quantity and quality of the crop ; and when the duration
of labour is so great that the attempts to justify it are rested
on absolute necessity alone.

" When the canes," says Mr. Beckford, " are in a state of
" perfection, they should be got off with as much celerity as
*' possible : for expedition, in the time of harvest, is of in-
" finite consequence to the quality, as well as the quantity
" of the produce. Should any delay at this particular time
" be occasioned, a drought might consequently supervene,
*' which would make at least a daily, if not an hourly diminu-
" tion of crop."* He proceeds to give further reasons for
despatch ; and shews afterwards, by animated descriptions of
the different processes of the grinding season, that the prin-
ciple is well followed up in practice. — "The labourers are
" now prepared for the expected harvest, &c. The shell is
" heard with a shrill alarm to call them forth, as it echoes
*' among the hills, &c. The overseer is anxious to give his
" orders to commence the crop ; he is the first in the field :
" the driver follows with his knotted stick, and his whip
" slung carelessly across his shoulder ; the latter walks brisklj/
" to the place of labour ; the negroes follow, and he shews
" them upon what part of the piece to begin. The tops of the
" canes are now in a constant tremor, the yellow swarths are

* Descriptive Account of the Island of Jamaica, vol. ii. p. 9. This is the
same writer, whose remarks on the situation of, the negroes, &c., I have
before more than once quoted. He is in both works equally zealous in his
defence of slavery, and the slave trade.

hi point of Intenseness. 173

" strewed upon the ground, and vigour and dispatch are oh-
" served in every hody, and apparent in every hand." " The
*• driver, with an authoritative voice, cautions them to cut the
" canes close, and not to waste too much of the top, &c. ; he
" keeps them in a regular string before him, and takes care
" to chequer the able with the weak, that the labour may not
" be too light for the first, nor too heavy for the last ; he in-
" timidates some, and encourages others ; and too often, per-
" haps, a tyrant in authority, imposes on the timid, and suffers
" the sturdy to escape."*

Perhaps the humane reader will see nothing to admire in
all this ; especially when he considers that the poor men and
women are thus kept to work all the day under the blaze of
a tropical sun ; not to mention their precedent and subsequent
night-work ; and that it lasts about five months in the year.
But Mr. Beckford tells us, " that the time of crop, particularly
" the commencement of it, exhibits a very lively and a pleasing
" scene, and every living creature seems to be in spirits and
" in expectation. "'f-

He adds, that " not only the negroes are alert and cheerful,
" but that the cattle and mules, recovered from the fatigue
" of the planting season, appear to be fresh and vigorous ;
*' nor do they seem to require the encouragement of the voice,
" nor to dread the thunders of the whip ; for this instrument
" of correction, whether it be in the hands of the cartman,
" the mule-boy, or the negro-driver, is heard in either case
" to resound among the hills, and upon the plains, and to
" awaken the echoes wherever the reverberations of the lash
•' shall pass. "J

* Ibid. p. 47-8. t Ibid. 50-51.

X I almost fear that this description of West Indian pastoral music
may suggest a doubt, whether I am not quoting, instead of an op-
ponent, a friend in disguise. I, therefore, beg leave to exemplify the ge-
neral spirit of the work, by the following extracts from this planters' con-
cluding remarks, in defence of the now reprobated African slave trade. —
" As the fate of the colonies seems to be now involved in the popular ques-
" tion of an abolition of the slave trade, I shall defer my observations upon
" this subject until ihephnnzi/ of the moment shall be abated, and the voice

174 Of tlie forced Labour of Slaves

I do not mean to dispute this writer's assertion, that the
slaves, as well as the cattle and mules, are all exhilarated and
invigorated in crop-time, or at least as he observably puts it
" at the commencement" of the crop. I have already noticed
the cause of that phenomenon ; and the extract from the work
of Mr. Bryan Edwards, which I have given, may suffice to
prevent any surprise from it ; at least as to the biped la-
bourers.

The effect of such an addition to the food of the slaves, as
cane-juice, in countervailing the debilitating tendency of
night-watching, and an increase of many hours in the diurnal
duration of labour, will prepare the reflecting mind to believe
what I shall demonstrate hereafter, the great insufficiency of
their ordinary sustenance at other periods of the year.
The same effect, from feeding on the cane-tops, appears to be
more transitory with the working cattle, from Mr. Beckford's
account ; for speaking of their work in crop-time, he says,
" What this labour is, their reduced and lank situation, will,
" I fear, sufficiently explain." What are we to infer from
this ? not certainly that the labour of the slaves is not also
much enhanced ; for the contrary has been shewn : the ob-
vious and true conclusion is, that the change of food is greater
and more influential with the negroes, than with their quad-
ruped fellow-drudges. The latter out of crop, are not left to
raise their own provisions, at such scanty periods as remain
between forced labour and repose. They have always had
enough to eat, though of less nutritious food than the cane-
tops.

It may be useful in this place, to compare the system of
foreign sugar planters with our own. There is a striking si-
milarity, or rather identity between them in almost every

" of reason shall allay that tempest which a measure so replete with danger
" cannot fail to excite ;" and in respect of the slaves' condition, " I shall, I
" hope, be excused if I dwell a little upon the seeming misery of their situ-
" ations, and then contrast the subjection of their lives with the needi/ inde-
" pendencij of the poor of England." " The negroes are slaves by nature."
" They have no idea of the charms of liberty," (Descriptive Account, &;c.
vol.ii. p. 49.)

in point of Intenseness. 175

point. Indeed, I am aware of no exception to the rule; nor is
it strange ; for if the common object is to obtain from the
slaves the maximum of potential exertion ; and if this has been
discovered long since, (as I maintain it has by general experi-
ment, and constant competition for the cheapest production
of the article, throughout the West India islands,) it was na-
tural, and almost inevitable, that there should soon be a general
uniformity of means ; more especially when it is considered
that by temporary conquests and cessions, the islands for the
most part have frequently interchanged their sovereigns and
their planters.

I will, therefore, here introduce some citation^ from a
French author of great eminence, M.Barre de St.Venant.
I am well entitled, under my general self-imposed restriction,
to cite him ; for he was not only a planter, and a champion
of colonial slavery, and of the slave trade, but one whose work
was highly extolled by all the French colonists ; and contri-
buted not a little to lead on and confirm Buonaparte in the
cruel and perfidious policy he adopted on the peace of Amiens
for the restitution of slavery at St. Domingo, and in the other
colonies of France.

I shall quote from the original work before me, published
at Paris in 1802, of which I believe we have no published trans-
lation ; but will give my extracts in English. — " The labour
" of those who cut the canes has some resemblance to that of
** reapers; but it is much greater and more animated, even upon
" the smallest sugar estates, than upon the most extensive
" farm, by the number and the rapidity of the carts loaded with
" canes, which arrive at a gallop at the mill, by those which
" carry the fuel (cane-trash) for the furnace, and green-herb
" (cane-tops) for the cattle, by the number of the men, and
" that of the labouring cattle." After describing the cattle-
mills, he says, " six mules are harnessed to two levers, or
" sweeps ; they set off at full gallop, go round and give a
" horizontal movement to the central cylinder, the cogs of
" which turn the two others. They then insert the bundles
" of canes between the cylinders ; they pass and repass be-
" tween them. About fifty barrels of cane-juice are expressed
** during the day, &c. — It may be conceived from this, that

176 Of t he forced Labour of Slaves

** the swiftness of the mules must be very great ; in fact they
" run over eighty toises in a minute.

'^ This movement is prodigious ; but that of the boihng-
" house, which is contiguous, is still more surprising. Under
" an exterior gallery are two or four men, who alternately
" work and rest. With the forks which they take up the
" fuel with, they feed the furnace tvithout cessation," &c.*

I will add from the same author his account of the night-
works and relays ; as it will shew the uniformity of that
species of oppression in the French, as well as the English
colonies. " The grinding commences ordinarily on Monday,
" and does not cease till Saturday at midnight ; it recom-
" mences on Sunday at midnight, and so continues till its
" termination ; and proceeds by day as well as night, with-
" out intermission either of the movements or the fires. —
" The workmen of the mill, and those of the boihng-house,
" are fixed to them for twenty-four hours successively. A
" like number of those who are in the fields come to relieve
" them at midnight. In so succeeding each other they keep
" turn and turn; and when the gang is not numerous it is
" necessary sometimes that they return to the night-work one
" day in three."

It would appear from this that three spells were the lowest
number in use in the French islands ; whereas we have seen
that in our own, there are often no more than two, and that
though, in computing the time of work, I have gratuitously
supposed them to be three, on an average, there are probably
very few estates which have so many. — " Some persons," he
says, " have wished to divide the station (at the works) of
" twenty- four hours into two parts, the one from midnight
" to noon, the other from noon to midnight." — " The ne-
" groes," he adds, (in the true spirit of our own colonial
apologists,) " have resisted so wise an arrangement ; it is
" opposed to their tastes, their habits, and their nocturnal
" courses ; it obliges them to re-appear too often, and they have

* Des Colonies Modernes sous La Zone Torride, Sec, par M. Barrt' de
St. Venant. Paris, 1802. p. 369. 371-2.

in point of Lilenseness, 1 77

" preferred an arduous station of four and twenty hours, to an
" easier one of twelve." ** That," he observes, " which is
"most surprising is, that instead of resigning themselves to
** sleep or to rest, when the midnight has released them from
"' their posts, one may see them run to a distance of two or
" three leagues, to pass the rest of the night in dances, or
" orgies, with their mistresses, and appear in the field at Jive
" o'clock in the morning to cut the canes ; the women as well as
" the men." *

These passages, when stripped of their glosses and exag-
gerations, and reduced to their true import, contain nothing
incredible or surprising. The choice is between a respite of
five hours at the utmost every night, and unbroken rest
during two nights in three ; and as during the respite of five
hours the poor negroes would not have time to visit their
wives, or mistresses, as the author calls them, who often re-
side on other estates, and to prepare, also, their meals for the
same or the following day, they may naturally enough prefer
the latter alternative. — Those English planters who have only
two spells, do not and cannot give their slaves any such
choice ; because as the same negroes have to take the spells
every second day, they would have to purchase an entire
night's rest, by watching and working for thirty-six, or ra-
ther thirty-seven hours, without intermission.

I say " rather for thirty-seven," because though I have taken
six in the morning as the time of returning to the day-work,
it was for the purpose of meeting the planters on their own
admission, that each negro who keeps spell loses six hours of
rest every night. In fact the field-work, in, as well as out of
crop, commences at five, as this French author fairly admits.
" In this instant, he adds, (i. e. at the midnight dismission)
** the negro is the most free of human beings ; no modesty,
" no decency, no human consideration, no fear, no moral sen-
" timent restrains him ; the marriage faith is no curb for him ;
** he is carried away by an impetuous passion ; the fatigue of
*^ the day is forgotten, nothing stops him, he runs where his
" desires call him ! The negro must be of all the human spe-

* Ibid. p. 379.
VOL. II. N

1 78 Of the forced Labour of Slaves

" cies the being the strongest, the most robust, and vivacious,
" for in the hot cUmates he is capable of the most extreme cor-
" poreal efforts, &,c. He will pass eight days without sleep,
" and sleep afterwards like a marmott ; he will pass from the
" excess of labour, or of agitation, to that of inertness, or
" absolute repose, without his temperament or his physical
*' constitution being altered."*

Thus did M. Barre de St. Venant attempt to palliate op-
pression by exaggerating the capacities of the unfortunate
victims to sustain it ; but he had no motive for over-stating
the, oppression itself; and neither in the duration of night-
work, nor its intensity, the points for which I cite him, does
he at all exceed the truth. In respect of the former, he falls
short even of what I have proved to be the practice in the
English colonies at the present day ; as the reader will per-
ceive if he turns back and compares with these extracts my
citations in the last chapter as to night-work in Jamaica.

In respect of the nocturnal habits of the sleepless slaves,
M. Barre's misrepresentation, the high colouring of a French
stile apart, is only such as our own planters continually
resort to. Like them, he ascribes to the slaves at large,
that which is true only in respect to a few individuals
among them, chiefly the drivers and headmen, whose robust
constitutions and better sustentation, (the consequence often
of their oppressions on their weaker brethren, the drudges of
the field,) may enable them sometimes to indulge their pas-
sions, during a respite which the common herd of drudges
can employ only in repose. If two or three among the former
are known on a single night in the week to visit their wives
or mistresses on a distant plantation, it is quite enough with
these colonial gentlemen, whether French or English, to war-
rant such general statements as to the negroes at large. Such
fallacies are their ordinary means of deceiving their credulous
European readers.

The West Indian witnesses before the Privy Council, and
the House of Commons, were not interrogated as to the celerity

Ibid, 379. 380.

in point of Intenseness. 179

of the different operations in crop-time; and prudently for-
bore to volunteer any statements on that subject. They all
admitted in general terms, that the work at that season, was
laborious ; but left it ambiguous whether they meant as to its
intenseness, or only its duration. One or two of them, how-
ever, gave comparative statements, from which much may be
inferred confirmatory of the preceding accounts.

Dr. Athill of Antigua, being asked. " Is or is not the cut-
" ting of canes one of the most laborious, services of the plan-
" tation ? Answered, it is laborious, but I do not think one
" of the most laborious ; it is performed with such alacrity,
" and good spirits, that it seems trifling."* Whether any
thing is meant by the alacrity of work in men with a driver
behind them, except that they work in quick time, the reader
may judge from the instructive testimony of Sir Ash ton War-
ner Byam, which I have cited in regard to the carriage of
dung ;f and as to the good spirits, in crop-time, see my quo-
tations from Mr. Beckford, and Mr. Edwards.;{: But the cutting
of canes, is here admitted to be laborious; and this obviously
must be, not from the vigorous stroke of the hatchet merely,
which the same witness tells us, in the same place, the wo-
men are as equal to as the men, but from its brisk and hur-
ried repetition.

Another witness, Mr. Campbell of Grenada, says " the cut-
" ing of the canes is not hard labour," but adds, " the feed-
" ^^'S ^f ^he mill, and the vjork done by the firemen, are the
" most laborious operations."^ Here the same remark ap-
plies ; for there can be no great muscular exertion in placing
the canes, which are within reach, between the cylinders, or
in forking bundles of cane-trash into the furnaces or copper
holes, if done in moderate time. It is the celerity of the in-
cessant operation that constitutes the fatigue. The rapid re-
volution of the cylinders as described by M. Barre de St. Ve-
nant, makes it necessary to supply fresh canes incessantly,
and such is the quick consumption of the dry cane trash and

* Commons Report of 1790, p. :V2d.

X Supra, p. 169. § Commons Report of 1790, p. 139.

N 2

180 Of lliejorccd Labour oj Slaves

wowra, that to feed the fires orco])per holes with them, is hke
feeding a furnace with paper. The driving of the cattle also,
and removal of the magoss, or bruised canes from the cylinders
of the mill, must keep pace with the rapidity of its motions.
Every process, in short, of the harvest is in general marked by
what the planters choose to call " alacrity and animation.'^

If the reader can still doubt, after fairly weighing the effect
of these colonial authorities, whether the labour of the slaves
is intense in point of exertion, as well as time, I would request
him again to consider the probabilities of the case ; remem-
bering that the extreme duration of the toil, increased largely
in crop-time, is not more within the compelling power of the
master exercised by his drivers, than the briskness of the la-
bour itself, that his profit depends most materially on dispatch
and that the number of slaves, is admitted to be often inade-
quate, especially in crop time, to the necessary operations of
the estate. The reducing them to six or five hours' respite in
the twenty-four, and withholding even that portion of rest
from the boilers, &c., would be still more opprobrious than it
is, if we supposed that any possible increase in the briskness
of the work might shorten its oppressive duration.

I conclude, then, from the evidence which I here adduced,
which applies to all the most ordinary species of labour, and
from this general reasoning also, that the toil of the slaves is
for the most part intense, either from the vigour or briskness
of their work.

To compare it, in this respect, demonstratively with that
of English peasants, is not easy, fur reasons which I have al-
Iready assigned; but I can truly assert, that except in the
bustle of our reapers in the corn harvest, (which one of my
authorities admits is not so great, as that of the cane cutters,)
I have seen nothing equal in this country in point of briskness
to what is called the " alacrity and animation,'" of negroes
in many of their employments. I have often seen our agri-
cultural labourers at their different operations, and if I
were even to strike out of the account, the important power
of pausing, to ease their sensations, or recruit their strength,
at their own arbitrament, without feeling or fearing the lash
of a driver, I should still say, that their labours are lighter,

/// point of lnlenseness. 181

because in general much slower, than those of the plantation
slave.

But were this doubtful, the vast difference of climate would
at once decide the question. In the one case, vigorous ac-
tion is at most seasons compensated by genial warmth ; in
the other, the fatigue is always aggravated by the waste of a
copious perspiration. This important consideration is by
the apologists of the system most unfairly thrown out of the
account. Because the negro can, and the European cannot
endure, a long exposure to the broiling sunbeams, with little
or no inconvenience in a state of rest, they assume that the
same distinction is equally felt under arduous or brisk ex-
ertion.

" An European," says Mr. Beckford, " who would be al-
" most dissolved, were he to work beneath the vertical ardours
" of a tropic sun, does not always consider, when he expresses
" his surprise that the negroes should be obliged to labour in
" such an intensity of heat, that the climate is congenial to
" their natui'al feelings, and that the careful benevolence of
•* Providence has thickened their skins, to enable them to
" bear, what would otherwise be insufferable : he is too apt
" to judge of then- constitutions and feelings by his own."*

Yes, a benevolent Providence has enabled them, as I have
before admitted, to bear an exposure to the sun ; because that
is the lot of their nativity ; but not to endure, without noxious
effects, excess of labour, though in their native climate, be-
cause from this, the same Providence has naturally exempted
them by the luxuriant fertility of the soil. It is not nature,
but the selfishness, the avarice and oppression of their fellow-
men, which alone can make it necessary ; and from such
sources of evil it has not pleased the Almighty to guard his
creatures in this probationary state.

Do these writers wish us to believe that the negro is not,
like the white man, subject to a noxious waste of the fluids
by brisk motion and excessive heat united ? Or is it requir-
ed that I should prove this law of our common nature also,
by the testimony of their own partizans ? If it be, I am able

Descriptive Account of Jumaica, vol.ii. GG, 66.

1 S2 Of the forced Labour of Slaves

to do so. Doctor Collins, in noticing the sudden check of
perspiration as a frequent cause of the maladies of the slaves,
says the effect is " to check the perspiration, which descends
" in torroits when the negroes are in health and at work.''*

Surely then, it is right, in this respect at least, to " judge of
" the constitutions and feelings of these poor creatures by our
" own," though such sympathies are repressed by their mas-
ters ; and to add to the enormous duration, and the intensity
of their work, the exhausting influence of the climate, in the
estimate we form of their suft'erinss.

I will not dismiss this branch of my subject without again
confessing, that some of my fellow-labourers have adopted
views of it different from my own ; alleging that the enormous
protraction of the work unavoidably diminishes the energy
with which it is performed : and one or two anti-slavery
writers have pushed that plausible theory so far as to contend,
that what is gained in time is lost in effect, and that free
men exerting themselves willingly, will perform- in a given
time more work than slaves.

Those who have held such opinions were, with only two
exceptions that I recollect, personally strangers to the system ;
and all of them practically so; and, therefore, perhaps did
not estimate sufficiently high the efficacy of the driving whip.
They were also naturally willing to adopt and propagate views
that tended to reconcile the disuse of brutal coercion with the
self-interest of the planters. Nor can it be altogether untrue,
that the slaves often work, with comparative languor at least,
in the more laborious toils of the field, after they have been
long continued ; for weariness and exhaustion, when felt by
the gang at large, will naturally relax the common exertions,
in spite of all that the terror of the driver's voice, or actual in-
flictions of his whip, can do to prevent it. The frequent prac-
tice of giving the extraordinary nutrition of a piece of bread
or a ship biscuit and a draught of grog, to recruit the strength
and raise the spirits of the slaves under those heavier opera-
tions, sufficiently proves that this is found to be the case.
Neither is it to be denied, that there is a most improvident
waste of work and diminution of its general effect, through

* Practical Rules, &.C., p. .08,

in point of Intensentss. 183

the heedless and indiscriminate way in which it is exacted,
and the neglect of mechanical aids. The slave, I admit, if
arbiter of his own exertions, might economise them so as
to produce in a given time a greater effect with much less
fatigue.

But no deduction that can reasonably be made on any or all
of these grounds, will serve so far to reduce the general ener-
gies of slave-labour, in regard at least to the actual pressure
on the workmen, as to make them bear any comparison with
the greatest ordinary exertions of free men in similar kinds
of labour, either in this or any other country. The dispa-
rity in point of time, however, is at once the most important,
and the most susceptible of clear investigation. This, there-
fore, I shall proceed to demonstrate in the following chapter.

184

CHAPTER Vf.

COMPARISON OF THE AMOUNT OF SLAVE LABOUR ON
SUGAR PLANTATIONS, WITH THAT OF AGRICULTURAL
LABOURERS IN ENGLAND.

Though I maintain, and I trust have proved, that the labours
of the slaves are, for the most part, excessive in point of inten-
sity, as well as cruelly so in point of time, it is in the latter
respect alone, that I propose to compare them with those of
our English peasants ; because, for reasons already assigned,
it is in point of time alone that the positive amount of each
can be measured or defined ; and consequently the difference
between them clearly ascertained.

It will be recollected, I hope, that the strange comparison
between the most oppressed and degraded beings that the sun
ever saw, and the peasantry of England, was no idle choice
of mine ; but what the planters and their advocates have
been bold enough to challenge. Their folly, however, in pro-
voking it, and especially in that worst article of their prac-
tical oppression, a murderous excess of labour, is so surprising,
that it may be right to shew, by some further quotations,
how frequent such temerity has been, and still is among them ;
lest I should be suspected of using unfairly against the many,
the extreme rashness of the few.

" The work of the negro slave in Jamaica," said the agent
and planters of that island before the Committee of Privy
Council, " is far less than that of a labourer in Britain."*

Piivy Council Report, part 3, title Jamaica, Q. A. No. 36.

Comparison of Slave Labour, $;c. 185

Q. to Mr, Gilbert Francklyn. " Upon consideration of food,
" labour, &c., have you been able to make any comparison
** between the condition of negroes in the West Indies, and
" that of poor labourers in this country," &c. ?

A. " I do not conceive that the poor of any country are
" better provided for, or live happier, than the generality
" of negroes upon plantations in the West Indies ; their labour
" is slight;' &c.*

Q. to Mr. James Baillie. " In general is the labour of the
" slaves proportioned to their ability, or can it be considered
** as severe ?"

A, " It is always in proportion to their ability, and cannot
" be considered as severe, when compared to the labour of the
" lower order of people in Europe.i- On the whole 1 am con-
'* vinced, that the labour of a negro slave, taken throughout
** the whole year, is by no means so severe as that of an
" English labourer.''^

See also the evidence of Sir Ralph Payne, afterwards Lord
Lavington, formerly quoted expressly and strongly to the same
effect. §

These statements were made, be it remembered, at a time
which the recent champions of the colonies, and the Jamaica
Assembly itself, admit to have been a period of much
indefensible severity in the treatment of slaves ; and when,
among other now repudiated oppressions, they are admitted to
have been worked to excess. Is it then also admitted by my
present antagonists, that the comparison with English la-
bourers must, in respect to that period at least, be abandoned?
By no means : they insist upon it still ; and are so far from
retracting the statements of 1790 which I have cited, as un-
true in respect of the then existing case, that they quote them
triumphantly, as the testimony of respectable witnesses given
before Parliament, and worthy therefore of peculiar credit.
Nay, that Goliah of the colonial host, Mr. M'Queen, arraigns
me and my fellow labourers of unfairness, in not always bring-
ing forward this former evidence, on the very point now in
question. " The labour of the slaves," he says, " is child's

* Commons Report of 1790, p. 91-2. f Ibid. 187.

X Evidence of Mr. Tobin, same Report, 266. § Supra, p. 22, 23.

186 Comparison of the Labour of Slaves

''play, compared to the loork performed by the labourers in
" this coujitry. Theij do not know what hard labour is; and
" it is not a little remarkable, that the enemies of the colonies
" are now bringing forward in support of their theories, that
" very evidence taken before Parliament, which they formerly
" either concealed or denied, which went to prove, that one
" European free man did as much luork in one day as three
" negroes. ^^*

Should any reader still doubt, whether I am fairly taking
issue with my opponents in general of the present day, on these
bold comparative statements, I need only refer him to the
printed Report of the Council of Barbadoes of July 22, 1823,
published and widely circulated by their agent here in the
following year, in which it is maintained as stoutly as ever,
that the condition of the slave is not only equal in point of
comfort, but superior to, that of the labouring class in this
country.-f-

In fact, few colonial witnesses, or writers, among the many
who have spoken and written on the subject in any stage of
the controversy, have been prudent enough not to challenge
or invite the same extravagant comparison. One of the latest
of them, Mr. Dwarris, has alone, I think, noticed the topic
with a discreet forbearance, by saying, " I am not of the num-
" ber of those who will compare the predial slave to the
" English labourer, in the latter's day of manly health and
** strength.":];

Let me proceed then to take up this gage thrown down by
almost all my antagonists, and to state what are the ordinary
portions of working time, which the best wages obtain from the
ablest agricultural labourers in England.

Most of my readers probably know well what these cus-
tomary portions are. But from a desire to obtain the most ac-
curate and particular information on the subject, for the use of
those who are not conversant with rural affairs, T wrote for it
long since to two geatlemen of landed property, and much intel-
ligence, the one in Cambridgeshire, the other in Leicestershire,

* West India Colonies, &c. p. 258-9.

f Report of a Committee of the Council of Barbadoes, juiblislicd by Sior,
Loudan, 1824, p. 23-4, &c.
t The West India (iueslion, tVc., p, 20,

with that of English Peasants. 187

both experienced farmers on their own estates ; and their ac-
counts received by me in answer, agree in the following state-
ment; which I will, therefore, transcribe,

" The time which the day-labourers in husbandry usually
'* continue at their work, may on an average throughout the
" year, be estimated at nine hours per diem."

" From Michaelmas to Christmas, making allowance for
" the different lengths of the days, they come to their work,
" one day with another, at seven in the morning, and leave it
" at five in the afternoon. Deducting two hours and a half
" for meals, going, and coming, there will remain seven hours
" and a half of clear labour. The same estimate may be made
" for the following quarter. From Lady-day to Midsummer,
*' they come to their work at six o'clock, and leave it at the
" same hour in the evening ; but as the season is warmer,
" they are a longer time absent from their work (about three
" hours), which will leave nine hours for work. In the other
" quarters, as the hay-season and the harvest comprehend the
" greater part of it, their wages are considerably higher, and
" more work is done ; and it may fairly be estimated that
" from Midsumm.er to Michaelmas, a labourer, after all de-
" ductions for meals, going and coming, and every other cause
** of absence, is twelve hours at his work, one day with ano-
*' ther. The average hours of work, in these several portions
" of the year, will amount to nine hours per diem, viz.

Hours per diem.
" Michaelmas to Christmas - - 7|

" Christmas to Lady-day - - - 7|
" Lady-day to Midsummer - - 9

" Midsummer to Michaelmas - - 12

36 — which,
" divided by four, gives an average of nine hours."

A highly intelligent friend who resides in Kent, and has
long farmed lands of his own there, has since confirmed this
estimate to me on his own experience and observation. I be-
lieve it, therefore, to be accurate, and applicable (with small
variations arising- from difference of latitude and modes of a«:ri-
cultural operations) to every part of tlie kingdom ; except
that, from the present unfortunate circumstances of the

188 Comparison of the Labour of Slaves

country, in respect of the poor laws, and want of full em-
ployment, the time of labour, in many places, is now mate-
rially reduced.

What, then, are the comparative results ? They are, that
the time of the slave-labour, to the time of the free-labour, is,
on an average of the whole year, as sixteen, at least, to nine ;
that the minimum of the former, much exceeds the maximum
of the latter; that in the crop-season of five months' duration,
the West India slave has but one-half at most of the diurnal
respite which the English labourer enjoys, even in the labo-
rious harvest quarter, viz. six hours, (not to say five only,) in-
stead of twelve.

The only consideration that can be alleged to alleviate, in
any degree, this contrast, is that the English labourer, like
the slave, has to walk to and from his place of daily work,
though he has not his meals to prepare from a raw state, and
dress, as a further abridgment of his daily respites ; still less
to renounce his dinner, that he may have time to raise his
food. But if the reader thinks that some allowance should
be made for his walks, to make the comparison, in all respects,
unobjectionable in regard to times of rest, let it be remem-
bered that, in taking sixteen hours as the annual average of
the slave's occupations, for the purpose of this comparison, I
have gratuitously struck off the fraction of forty minutes
from the result of a calculation in which I had previously taken
every doubtful or disputable portion of those occupations at
the lowest probable estimate : let it be remembered also, that I
have left Sabbath-work wholly out of the account. If, ne-
vertheless, some abatement of the vast difference should be
claimed in respect of the English labourer's walks, or any
other ordinary addition to the time of actual work for his
employer, the claim might be largely allowed, without any
material benefit to the case of my opponents, or prejudice to
my own. Enough of indisputable fact would remain to make
the contrast enormously great.

I might safely even here restore to the possession of my oppo-
nents, most of the artful glosses, fallacies and impostmes,
which, by reviewing their own evidence, I have wrested from
their hands. Supposing the noontide, as well as the morning re-
spite, to be time of actual rest, the field-work to begin and end
at six, instead of five and seven, and no necessary employment to

ivith that of English Feasants. 189

precede the driver's morning muster, or follow his evening
dismissal ; nay, supposing we were generally to adopt that
gross standing sophism of my opponents, in their delusive
use of the terms labour and I'e^t, including in the former only
the work enforced by the whip for the direct immediate profit
of the master, and giving the name of rest or leisure to every
other employment, however fatiguing, of men and women
who have to provide for their own support ; and were we more-
over to reduce the labours of a five-months' harvest to the lowest
amount that the most disingenuous colonist has alleged, — still
the time of slave-labour between the tropics, woould be found
very largely to exceed all that the best wages and competi-
tion for employment can obtain from the free peasantry of
England. But when the reader contemplates the real dura-
tion of slave-work as demonstrated in a former chapter, recol-
lecting, at the same time, that it is exacted from both sexes
alike ; and that, while the English peasant is recruited every
week by an inviolable Sabbath rest, the poor field-negro has,
for the most part, on that day, little more than a change of
work ; he will, I doubt not, feel both astonishment and in-
dignation at those bold impositions on the British public,
which have called for these comparative views.

The comparison, after all, or rather the shocking and op-
probrious contrast, would be very imperfect, if we were to
look no further than the respective times of labour. Two
considerations of vast importance remain to be taken into the
account, viz. the different climates in which the work is to be
performed, and the distressing means by which that of the
West Indies is enforced.

The latter is so momentous a subject, and involves so many
kinds of pernicious and odious oppression, that it would be
wrong to treat of it incidentally, merely as an aggravation of
the general excess of toil. It well deserves to be the subject
of a separate division in this work ; especially as I have to
redeem it, like the rest, from gross controversial falsehood.
But let me here observe, by the way, that a given duration
of work, which might be moderate if regulated by the will of
each individual workman, as to its modes, its continuity, and
its pauses, might become excessive and intolerable, when in-

190 Comparison of tJie Lahoni of Slaves.

discriminately enforced on a great number of men and women
of different degrees of strength, by the coercion or present
terror of the whip. Postponing this sad topic for the present,
let us look for a moment at the extreme inequality between
a given portion of field-labour performed in England, and the
same portion of it in the torrid zone.

Here I must request my readers to look back on my pre-
liminary remarks on this subject, and the authorities by which
they were supported.* We have seen what are the instinctive
universal propensities of the human race, in respect of labour
or repose between the tropics, and the strong reasons we have
for believing that these propensities were implanted in us by
the gracious Author of our frames, for self-conservatory ends.
He who does nothing in vain, nothing unwisely, has been
fairly shewn by my zealous antagonist. Major Moody, to have
provided a triple natural safeguard against voluntary excess of
labour under a vertical sun, by the great bounty of nature in
the production of food in that climate, by the aversion which
all men naturally feel there to long continued labour in the
sun, and by their love of repose and of the shade ; whereas
in England, field-labour, unless pushed beyond the strength
of the workman, is at most seasons opposed by no such
propensities, but by a vicious love of idleness in the ill-re-
gulated mind, alone. Though labour, when a necessary task,
is in some degree every where unpleasant, many independent
and affluent men here, often take from choice as much bodily
exercise, though of a different kind, as the day-labourers
around them : but the master in a hot climate, though a
native of it, is like his servant, prone to indolence or bodily
inaction. It is the case with white Creoles to a proverb ; and
is admitted, even by men of their own party in this contro-
versy, to be their general characteristic.

What, then, are we to conclude as to the point in ques-
tion ? Are habits that violently controul our natural propen-
sities, more easy than those which fall in with them ? Is
excessive labour less oppressive to the mind and body of the
slave, because it is what his nature strongly revolts at, and

See Chiipter H

with that of English Peasants. 191

because it deprives him during the solar hours of that rest and
refreshment in the shade, which are his main desire and de-
light ? Or are there such benign virtues in the driving whip,
that they sustain hi# strength, exhilarate his spirits, and con-
vert repugnance and pain, into animal gratification ? Either
these absurdities are truths, or the same continuity of field-
labour which our peasantry sustain, would be in a high de-
gree irksome and severe to the slaves of a sugar estate.
What, then, must be its duplication ! ! What less than it
really is to a large part of them, exhaustion and weakness,
sickness, and premature death ?

192

CHAPTER VII.

THE INIEANS BY WHICH LABOUR IS ENFORCED ON SUGAR
PLANTATIONS GREATLY AGGRAVATE ITS SEVERITY,
AND ARE IN THEIR NATURE AND EFFECTS EXTREMELY
CRUEL AND PERNICIOUS.

Section I. — Preliminary Remarks.

One of the many difficulties which an advocate of the unfor-
tunate slaves has to encounter, is that of determining what part
of the premises he has to reason upon may be safely assumed ;
and what part of them it may be necessary or expedient to
prove ; or rather to prove anew ; for on the one hand he may
be thought needlessly to trespass on the patience of his
readers ; and on the other hand maybe prejudiced by doubts
that may have been produced in their minds through stale and
often refuted, but boldly reiterated falsehoods.

If in any part of the case, I might now be relieved from this
difficulty, it would seem to be the odious practice of driving ;
for though an account of it, which I published near twenty-
eight years ago, was then boldly denied by the colonial party,
and was arraigned of falsehood and calumny, even by some
respectable colonial proprietors in their parliamentary places,
it has been since so clearly confirmed by many of the planters
themselves, and their partizans, that its veracity might be
supposed to be placed quite beyond the reach of contradiction
or doubt. The practice too has become, if we except some
idle glosses on its actual nature, a subject not only of avowal,
but of tenacious defence, by the colonial assemblies, and their
controversial champions in this country. Nor is there one of
the reformations proposed by his Majesty's government, in

hy which Slave Labour is enforced. 193

pursuance of the resolutions of parliament, to which a more
general and obstinate opposition has been given, than that of
laying aside the driving whip.

Ought I then to detain my readers by now adducing evi-
dence to shew that the slaves are really driven? I feel that
the tolerably well informed part of them will regard it as a
most superfluous work ; but so very important is this part of
the case, and so formidable are the powers of bold and artful
misrepresentations, when the impostures of the press are
seconded by a thousand self-interested tongues, that I dare
not eveii in this instance leave any inlet to scepticism, when I
can close it by irrefragable proofs.

I will, therefore, in the first place describe this brutal method
of coercion in the very words of the description which I gave
of it to the public, in a work long since out of print, early in
the year 1802 ; it is ofl'ered, I beg my readers again to ob-
serve, not as matter of evidence ; but as merely an exposition
of the case, which I undertake to prove. I think it better and
fairer in this instance, as I did in quoting Mr. Ramsay's
pamphlet, to shew exactly what the statements that led to
the long continued and yet subsisting controversy originally
were, than to substitute any terms that are new.

It was with almost equal fulness published in an Appendix,
No. 5, to my former volume; but as that book, which has been
long, like the former, out of print, is not likely to be in the
possession of all who may read the present, and as the state-
ment is one which I shall here have to support by evidence, as
well as to apply and reason upon, it is excusable, and per-
haps necessary, to give the extract again.

Section II. — Driving described.

My account of the practice was as follows : — " Every man
" who has heard any thing of West India affairs is acquainted
" with the term negro drivers, and knows, or may know, that
" the slaves in their ordinary field-labour are driven to their
*' work, and during their work, in the strict sense of the term
" driven as used in Europe ; though this statement no more

vor,. 11. o

194 Of the cruel and 'pernicious Means

" implies that the lash is incessantly, or with any needless
" frequency, applied to their backs, than the phrase to drive
" a team of horses imports, that the waggoner is continually
" smacking his whip." " It is enough for my purpose, that
" in point of fact no feature of West India slavery is better
" known, or less liable to controversy, or doubt, than this es-
" tablished method in which field-labour is enforced." (So I
certainly thought when penning those paragraphs for the pub-
lic. I had not then sufficiently learnt of what temerity in
assertion my opponents were capable when their bad cause
required it.) " But a nearer and more particular view of this
" leading characteristic may be necessary to those who have
" never seen a gang of negroes at their work."

" When employed in the labour of the field, as for example
" in holeing a cane-pieee, i. e. in turning up the ground into
" parallel trenches for the teception of the cane-plants, the
" slaves of both sexes, from twenty perhaps to fourscore in
" number, are drawn out in a line, like troops on a parade,
"■ each with a hoe in his or her hand ; and close to them in the
" rear is stationed a driver, or drivers, in number duly pro-
" portioned to that of the gang. Each of the drivers, who are
" always the most vigorous and active negroes on the estate,
" has in his hand, or coiled round his neck, from which by ex-
** tending the handle it can be disengaged in a moment, a
" long thick and strongly plaited whip, called a cart-whip ;
" the report of which is as loud, and the lash as severe, as
" those of the whips in common use with our waggoners ; and
" which he has authority to apply at the instant when his eye
" perceives an occasion, without any previous warning. Thus
" disposed, their work begins, and continues without inter-
" ruption for a certain number of hours, during which at the
*' peril of the drivers an adequate portion of land must be
" holed."

" As the trenches are generally rectilinear, and the whole
" line of holers advances together, it is necessary that every
" hole or section of the trench should be finished in equal
^' time with the rest ; and if any one or more negroes were
" allowed to throw the hoe with less rapidity or energy than
" their companions in other parts of the line, it is obvious

bif tvliich Slave Labour is enforced. 195

*' that the work of the latter must be suspended, or else such
" part of the trench as is passed over by the former will be
" more imperfectly formed than the rest. It is, therefore,
" the business of the drivers not only to urge forward the
" whole gang with sufficient speed, but sedulously to watch
*' that all in the line, whether male or female, old or young,
" strong or feeble, work as nearly as possible in equal time,
*• and with equal effect. The tardy stroke must be quicken-
" ed, and the languid invigorated, and the whole line made
** to dress, in the military phrase, as it advances : No breath-
** ing time, no resting on the hoe, no pause of langour, to
" be repaid by brisker exertion on return to work, can be
" allowed to individuals. All must work or pause to-
" gether."

" I have taken this work, (it was added,) as the strongest
" example : but other labours of the plantation are conducted
'' on the same principle, and as nearly as may be practicable,
" in the same manner. When the nature of the work does
" not admit of the slaves being drawn up in line abreast,
*' they are disposed, when the measure is feasible, in some
" other regular order, for the facility of the driver's super-
" intendance and coercion. In carrying the canes, for instance,
" from the field to the mill, they are marched in files, each
" with a bundle on his head, and with the driver in the rear :
" His voice quickens their pace, and his whip when neces-
" sary urges on those who attempt to deviate, or loiter on
" their march."*

Section. III. — Denials and misrepresentations of the practice
stated and refuted.

Cavils were made by different antagonists at some parts of
this description, which I will not stop particularly to notice,
because they have been either grounded on palpable miscon-
structions, and mutilations of the text, or related to circum-
stances obviously of no importance. But some colonial pro-

* The Crisis of the Suoar Colonies. Hatchavd, 1802, p. 9 to 12.

o 2

,1 96 Of the cruel and pernicious Means

piietors of great respectability, declared in the House of
Commons, soon after the appearance of the work, in general
terms, that the account was false ; or at least that they were
so informed and so believed; though the more ordinary course
then, as now, was to pretend that the driver did not, and
" dared not use his whip ; that it was a mere symbol of his
" office, like the staff or laced hat of a parish beadle, and
** that he was a mere superintendant of the work.

Mr. Dallas, in his history of the Maroon war, a work
that soon after appeared, asserted on his own experience in
Jamaica, that the driver's whip was a mere emblem of
office. He affected to advise the planters to lay it aside,
in order to avoid insidious misrepresentations of the business
of the driver, " unhickili/ so called,'' and to propose that in its
stead he " should have a laced hat, and a lono- staff like a
drum-major's."* Others again, like the Barbadoes Assembly
at this period, thinking such impostures too gross, asserted
only that restrictions were imposed on the driver's power or
practice of whipping. " The overseer (meaning as the con-
" text shews, the driver), is never permitted to inflict any
" punishment, except an occasional lash during the time of
" work ; and that is generally given over the clothes. "+

The same pretexts, inconsistent and absurd though they
are, and often refuted by myself and others on the most de-
cisive evidence, are still in current use among the apologists
of slavery ; and have again been brought forward, with more
than ordinary boldness, by that highly favoured and munifi-
cently rewarded champion of the planters, Mr. M'Queen.

1 have cited from that writer already,;}: his idle attempts to
disprove the driving practice, on the ground of the driver's
precession to the place of labour at the dawn. But he does
not stop there; he has the inconceivable confidence to add,
'' loherever they go, or whatever theij are about, he goes before

* Hist, of the Maroons, vol. ii. p. 419—20.

t Evidence of Mr. Kerby, a planter of Antigua ; Report of 1790, p. 309.
(See Admiral Edwards's testimony that they in general " icorkcd nuked.'"
Same Report, p. 412.) He meant no doubt to the waist, which is still a very
ordinary case.

X Supra, p. 120.

hij which Slave Labour is enforced. 197

" them, and stands before them, and not behind them ; nor dare
*' he use a whip to any one unless he is commanded.''*

Lest it should be supposed that I take advantage of the
rashness of this dashing pensioner of tlie planters, to prejudice
his employers unfairly jf and that he has here exceeded his
instructions, let nie also quote a concurrent authority no less
respectable than that of the council and assembly of St. Vin-
cent, in a solemn address to their Governor, Sir Charles Bris-
bane, dated the 4th September, 1823, which was officially
transmitted in answer to Earl Bathurst's circular letter, recom-
mending to them reformations of their slave code, and is still
referred to by some of my opponents as a paper of great au-
thority.

" It is true," they say, " that on most plantations the

* West India Colonies, &,c. p. 256.

f Having mentioned this writer more than once as a mercenary antago-
nist, employed by the assemblies and planters, and largely paid by them for
his pre-eminent zeal in their service, it may be right to apprise my readers,
that the fact of his liberal retainers, is far from being matter of secrecy or re-
serve in the sugar colonies. His rewards have been repeatedly announced
in strains of eulogy by various newspapers there; and I have now before me,
the Jamaica Courant of April 2Q, 1828, in which the fact of his having
received in one instance 3000/. sterling is noticed in a different stile.
*' iou Master M' Queen have received 3000/. sterling )?ione>/," and again,
^' You Master M'Queen are the hired advocate of slavery.^'

That this should be cast in his teeth in the West Indies, where no
printer dares commonly insert a single line in opposition to the common
cause, may seem somewhat strange. The explanation is, that Mr. M'Queen is
thus contemptuously treated for having censured the alleged communica-
tion to a Jamaica printer of the Duke of Manchester's private letter
to Lord Bathurst, and for his opposition to Mr. Beaumont and his pamphlet
entitled, " Compensation to Slave Owners ;" a work which, it is added, " has
" obtained the sanction of all liberal men in Jamaica," and " their most
" flattering testimonials of their approval, Jiot by a sum of money. Master
" M'Queen, for endeavouring to persuade the people of Great Britain, that
" slavery is a choice blessing of humanity ; an attempt as hopeless as it is dis-
" graceful, arid which every reasoning man must laugh at."

The dupes of this writer's incessant misrepresentations and railings against
me, and all the opponents of slavery, will here see what is thought of their
understandings where the real case is known ; and may, perhaps, lose some
of their confidence in tlic Glasgow Courier, Blackwood's Magazine, the
Morning Journal, and other ordinary vehicles of his mercenary labours.

J 98 Of the cruel and pernicious Means

" driver, as he is called {for the West Indians have been ex-
" tremely wfortunate in terms,) or the negro overseer, who is
" always promoted to this situation for his superior intelligence
" honestly, and humanity, whose employment is to collect the
" labourers in the field, and to superintend them at their
" work, carries this cart-whip in his hand as a symbol of his
" authority. Itis his business to repairto the placeoflabourearly
" in the morning, and by the crack of his whip, to give notice
" to the negroes that it is time for them to assemble, as well as
" of the place where their presence is required. The same use is
" made of the whip at noon and atnight, as a signal that they
" may give up work and retire to their homes. But the reading
'•' of the 18th section of the slave act, already quoted, must
" be convincing proof that this driver is neither required, nor
" permitted to punish the negroes under his charge at his
" will and pleasure : for the legislature which restrained its
" use in the overseer of the estate, to whom such an extensive
" and valuable property is often solely entrusted, and forbids
" his inflicting more than ten stripes, unless the proprietor or
" his representative be present, could never have contemplat-
" ed that the negro driver was to whip at his own discretion.
" The truth is, that no such practice being allowed, the legislature
" did not provide against that which never did, and never
" COULD HAPPEN. A good disposed negro has nothing to
'' fear from the driver; and one of a different character has only
'' to dread a representation of his negligence or improper behaviour
*' to the manager at noon^ or in the evening, xvhen he makes his
" report of the business of the day^ ^'c*

Here we have Mr. McQueen not only confirmed, but, I
must confess, much surpassed, in those merits which have
earned for him such high colonial plaudits, and munificent
rewards. The passage well deserves particular and close at-
tention, as an instructive specimen of the candour and veracity
to be looked for in West Indian documents on these sub-
jects, even when they emanate from the highest local au-
thorities.

* Communication from Sir Charles Brisbane, governor of St. Vincent
&c. and joint reply of the Council and Assembly; printed by C. M. Willick,
London, and largely distributed by the West India party here, p. 43, 44.

hif which Slave Labour is enforced. 190

The argumentative part of the imposition is curious enough.
Because these colonial legislators had so far complied with
the long-continued solicitations of the mother country, as not
to leave the most cruel excesses in the use of the vindictive
whip, without any legal restraint, we are gravely desired to
infer that they could not mean to permit the use of the coer-
cive or driving Mvh\p at all ; though it is, in their own estimate,
as we shall presently see, the main spring of their agri-
cultural system. It would be just as fair and as rational to
infer, that because parliament, a few years ago, at the instance
of Mr. Martin, made a law to restrain wanton cruelty towards
horses and other working cattle, it could not mean to permit
coachmen or carmen to use whips in their ordinary business ;
and, consequently, that any such practice as the driving coach
or cart-horses with whips, must have been unknown at the
time in this country.

What were the prohibitions to which these gentlemen
refer ? To quote them from their own context, they are,
" That, in order to restrain arbitrary punishment, no slave on
" any plantation or estate shall receive more than ten stripes
" at one time, and for one offence, unless the owner, attorney,
" guardian, executor, administrator, or manager of such plan-
" tation or estate, having such slave under his care, shall be
" present ; and no such owner, &c. shall on any account
" punish a slave with more than thirty-nine stripes, at one
" time, or for one offence, &.c. under a penalty not less than
" 15/., or more than 30/. for every such offence, to be re-
" covered," &,c.*

The same idle restrictions had been long before enacted in
other colonies ; but none of their authors have been ingenious
enough to make this use of them ; and some of their cham-
pions, while taking ample credit for such laws, recognize,
nevertheless, the subsisting use of the driver's whip, and de-
fend it as a necessary practice.

These lawgivers of St. Vincent, it will be observed, virtually
admit that if the driver had the power of whipping, in any
degree, by his own authority, it was a power that ought to

Ibid. p. 30.

200 Of the cruel and pernicious Means

have been abolished ; and also that its abolition was not within
the purview of their enactments. In the latter admission,
there certainly was nothing gratuitous ; for what are the
sanctions in the clause they cite ? Pecuniaiy penalties only,
to he recovered by legal proceedings. The offences in contem-
plation, therefore, could only have been those committed by
free persons ; whereas the drivers are universally slaves,
against whom no such proceedings could have place. Had
it been meant to restrain them, corporal punishments only
would, as usual, have been ordained for their transgressions.

But it is confessed that there was no such meaning ; and
these honourable legislators gravely desire the British public
to believe, that it was merely because it had never entered ** into
" their contemplation''' to suppose that the drivers coidd ever use
their whips at all, except by the manager's order on their return
to the homestall. '-They did not provide against that which never
" did, and never could happen ! ! .'"

We must conclude, then, if we admit their excuse or ex-
planation, or, indeed, if we would acquit them of direct and
flagrant falsehood, that they had never, during a controversy
of above thirty years continuance, in which they themselves
had been earnestly engaged, heard a word of that which has
so long been a prominent charge against their system among
anti-slavery writers ! ! This is the more surprising, because
they do me the honour to notice, in the same paper, my la-
bours in this cause, though in no complimentary strains ;
and I am certainly guiltless of having omitted, in any of my
writings, to bring forward the driving practice with the strong
reprehension that it deserves.

If the charges of their opponents had been unknown, we
must, to support their veracity, further suppose them igno-
rant, that gentlemen of their own party, aye, and planters of
their own small island, had strangely alleged and censured
the general practice of this thing, *' which never did and never
'* could happen /" They had not, we must presume, ever read
or heard of, that far-famed work, the " Practical Rules" of
their late fellow-colonist, and fellow-planter. Dr. Collins ! I
beseech the reader, if only for curiosity's sake, to collate with
this assertion of the St. Vincent's Council and Assembly,

by which Slave Labour is enforced. 201

some of the passages I have already cited from that work ;*
and among them the following extract.

" The consequence of which (i. e. of the gang being badly
" assorted in respect of strength) is that either the weaker
" negroes must retard the stronger ones, or your drivers, in-
" sensible of the cause of their backwardness, or not weighing
" it properly, will incessantly urge them, either with stripes or
" threats, to keep up with the others, by which means they are
** overwrought, and compelled to resort to the sick-house."

" Incessantly urging them with stripes !" visionary and pre-
posterous idea ! cruel and audacious calumny on a system
which the author was himself engaged in, and which he in-
sidiously affected to extenuate ! Why Dr. Collins, you well
knew that the drivers never did, or ever could give them a
a stripe when at their work at all. It is solemnly asserted by
the honourable legislators of St. Vincent, the very island in
which you lived thirty years, that the infliction of a single
stroke by the driver's authority, is a thing that " never did, and
" never could happen." Such a practice never was heard of by
any planter of that island ; — never entered into the contem-
plation of its lawgivers, as a possible case, against which they
had to provide !

But Dr. Collins's strange libels on the system he had been
so long engaged in, went still further. " Sorry am I to say
*' (he tells us in another place) that by much too frequent
" use hath been made of this instrument," (the cart-whip)
" and that it is often employed to a degree which, by inducing
" a callosity of the parts, destroys their sensibility, and ren-
" ders its further application of little avail. It is not unusual
" to arm the negro drivers with it, and to leave the use of it to
" their discretion : of course it is administered, neither ivith im-
" partiality, nor judgment ; for it is generally bestowed with
" rigour on the weakest negroes of the gang, and on those who
" are so unfortunate as not to be in favour with this sub-despot :
" and that too frequently on any part of the naked body,f or the
" head, whilst the more able negroes, who sometimes deserve
" it, escape with impunity. Now as this cannot easily be

* Supra, p. 39 & 98. f See supra, p. 196.

202 Of the cruel and pernicious Means

" prevented while the whip remains in such hands, I would
" propose to banish it entirely from the field, and to allow
" the driver to carry thither only a small stick or switch, and
" that rather as an ensign of authority than as an instrument
" of correction, as I am informed hath been practised on some
" estates in Barbadoes."*

I beg the reader to observe that this long experienced
planter of St. Vincent, was obliged to resort to another colony
for even a hearsay example of any exception to a practice which
the legislators of St. Vincent have the superlative confidence
to represent as one that could not enter into their contem-
plation, because it never existed !

That he was misinformed, even as to the supposed excep-
tion, will not be doubted, when I have added the further
evidence on this subject, which we are furnished with on no
less authority than that of the Council of Barbadoes itself, in
the report before cited, dated the 22nd July, 1823, and pub-
lished by their agent in this country.

That honourable body, and the witnesses examined by
them, were certainly desirous enough of denying every prac-
tice repugnant to the feelings of the British people, that could,
with any colour of probability, be denied. Among other
points, the practice of driving, was one they much laboured
to extenuate : and at no small expence of truth ; but not hav-
ing the nerves of their St. Vincent neighbours, they did not
venture to deny the driver's power of whipping; still less to
speak of it as a thing unknown, and beyond the range of
their imagination. They thought it enough to assert that
the power extended only to a certain number of lashes at a
time.

For this purpose, Foster Clarke, Esq. one of their witnesses,
deposed as follows : — " The overseers of the field-work, or as
" they are often called dri\ers, are permitted at no time to give
" a negro more than six stripes ivith a cat. If the obstinacy and
" aiiru/i/ conduct of any negro requires a greater punishment, he
*' is reported to the manager.'"-\

* Practical Rules, 201-2.

t Report of the Barbadoes Council, &c. of July 22, 1823. Printed in
Loudon, 1824, p. 110.

h}f which Slave Labour is enforced. 203

William Sharp, Esq., another witness, is thus reported to
the same effect. " Saith, that the driver is restrained in his
" authoritij. He is not allowed to iirftict more than six stripes ; if'
" greater punishment is necessary/, the ojjhider is reported to the
" manager.''*

Strange extenuation this, supposing it to be true ! Only
six stripes at a time in the use of the driving whip on human
beings ! ! ! Why if a carman or ploughman were to give as
many to his horses for every halt, or bad movement, every
spectator would exclaim against his barbarity, and be ready,
perhaps, to take him before a magistrate for an offence against
Mr. Martin's Act.

But that to which I would beseech the particular attention
of my readers, is the astonishing contrast between these de-
fensive representations of the general practice in Barbadoes,
and the cotemporary statements from the council and assembly
of the neighbouring island of St. Vincent ; and from that
champion of all the colonies, who stoutly affirms " that the
" driver dares not use a whip to any one, unless lie is commanded."
The legislature or people of Barbadoes, among others, lauded
and paid him for that bold perversion of truth, while the
cotemporary report of their own council thus clearly proved
it to be such !

To be sure the West Indians, if not " extremely unfortu-
nate," as the St. Vincent paper tells us, " in their terms" must
have been so in their friends, and in the apologists of their
own body ; for we have also seen what Mr. De la Becbe has
more recently published on this subject; availing himself, no
doubt maliciously, like their enemies, of this unlucky mis-
nomer, to persuade the British public that the drivers really
do drive.

" Then it is," says he (viz. in the morning muster), " that
" the negroes suffer xno^i from the driver's whip, J'ur he unfor-
" tunatehj can, upon his own authority, injlict punishment on
'' those tvho are not in time, thus makitig him the judge of an
" excuse that might appear quite valid to the manager. "f Strange

Iljid. p. 1 IG. t See the quotation more at large, supra, 98.

204 Of the cruel and pernicious Means

and suicidal calumniator of a system he is himself engaged
in ! What more could he have said if he had been called as
a witness by the anti-slavery party expressly to discredit and
disgrace the distinguished M'Queen, and the honourable St.
Vincent legislators ?

Let me quote, however, another passage from the same
recent authority. " With few exceptions, the drivers on Ja-
" maica estates carry either whips or cats : on some they are
" little used, but I am afraid thei/ are not alwai/s mere symbols
" oj authority, &c. On estates where the whip is permitted
" as a stimulus to labour, the driver stands near the negroes
" when at work, and has the power of inflicting punishment at
" his oivn discretion upon those who may appear to him to be
" idle ; a power, as may easily be imagined, liable to much
" abuse, and one which should be abolished ; it being no
" more than common justice that enquiry should be instituted
" previous to punishment, setting aside the revolting idea of
" impelling human beings to their labour by the whip."*

Another experienced planter, Mr. Stewart of Jamaica, in a
work that issued from the press in the same year (1823) with
the St. Vincent's legislative address, thus writes : " However
" averse a proprietor may be to the too free use of the whip,
" abuses will prevail while it is suffeped to be used at all.
** Even an overseer cannot, if he was so disposed, effectually
•* controul the unjust and arbitrary exercise of it by the
" drivers, zvho are too generally hard hearted and partial in
'* their distributions of the minor punishments they are autho-
" rised to inflict. A driver may maltreat and persecute in a
" petty way the unfriended slave against whom he has a grudge,
" while he connives at the faults of those whom he wishes to
" favour."f The same writer, speaking of the sensations of a
newly arrived plantation assistant, called a bookkeeper, from
Europe, says : " He finds himself placed in a line of life, where
*' to his first conception every thing wears the appearance of
*' barbarity and slavish oppression. He sees the slaves as-

* Notes, &c. by Mr. De la Beche, p. 20. 21.

f " View of the past and present state of the Island of Jamaica, by Mr.
Stewart." Edinburgh, 1823. App. 346.

hy xohkh Slave Labour in enforced. 205

" senibled in gangs in the fields, and kept to their work hy the
" terror of the whips borne by black drivers, certainly not the
" most gentle of human kind," &c.*

Had Mr. Stewart meant to expose in all points the false-
hood of the cotemporary statements of the St. Vincent's Coun-
cil and Assembly, how could he have done it more effectually?
The much-extolled drivers '' chosen for distinguished humanity"
are not only, we find, authorized to whip at their discretion,
but too generally abuse their power. They are hard-hearted,
as well as partial and unjust. And who can doubt that such
must be the ordinary effect of an office, the daily and hourly
business of which is the inflicting pain on their fellow-crea-
tures? The discerning reader could hardly have overlooked
the anxiety of the honourable St. Vincent's legislators, to var-
nish the characters of their drivers, in connection with state-
ments, which if true, made their humanity of no account.

Should I be supposed to pay more attention than is due to
this report, considering the numerous impostures of the same
kind that I have the painful duty to expose, let me remark,
that it was a public document highly extolled in the colonial
circles here ; though I can truly say that the passage cited does
not exceed in misrepresentation its account of the system in
many other parts not within the scope of this work. It was not

* Ibid. p. 192.

In quoting this writer as an opponent, I should be unjust not to add, that
he is a far more candid one than almost any other whose works I have cited,
with the exception of Mr. De la Beclie and Dr. Collins ; and that though
his habits as a planter, and his connections with West Indians, have led him
into great partiality (unconsciously perhaps) in many parts of his work, his
intentions, as I believe, were good. That I am nevertheless entitled to use
his authority as a partizan of the colonies in this controversy is manifest
from the general spirit of his work ; and the following extracts may suffice to
prove it. " Such improvements in the slave-laws, as can with perfect safety
" be made at the present moment, should be carried into effect, not by the
" Imperial Parliament, as has been strongly recommended, but by the co-
" lonial legislators to whom belongs the right of regulating all matters con-
" nected with their internal policy," &c. " Tliose who would persuade the
" British Parliament to legislate for the colonies may be very well meanino-
" people, but unquestionably they are not aware of the consequences of
" what they recommend." — p. 247.

206 Of the cruel and pernicious Means

only boasted of as a most powerful and satisfactory defence of
the common cause ; but some respectable West India mer-
chants and proprietors (themselves no doubt deceived, as too
many of them unfortunately are, in respect of the real case)
sent copies of it to anti-slavery friends, whom they good-
naturedly hoped to convert by it. I myself had the honour
of such a present, from gentlemen of whose good intentions
I am almost as sure, as I am of the utter insincerity and
falsehood of the composition they so much valued. Let me
then in return direct their attention further, both to the ex-
treme ai'tfulness, and manifest falsehood of its contents.

" There is no party or individual," the report adds, " in
*' the colony, who is not willing to take from the hands of the
" driver, that tvhich he is only alloiced to carry as a mark of his
" authority. But the time and the mode must be left to those
" only who know how difficult ; nay, how dangerous, it is to
" make the most immaterial alteration in a system built upon
" the unsolid foundation of influence and opinion. The time
" is still far distant %vhen it would be either prudent or safe to
" hint to this class of persons, that they are no longer amenable
" to corporal punishment, restrained and guarded even as the
" application of it noiu is.''*

Surely these gentlemen must estimate very meanly the
understandings of the people of England, when they hope to
delude them by flimsy and contradictory pretences like these !
" A mark of his authoriti/ F' Why, if they tell truth, the
driver has no authority to mark. He is a mere inspector and
reporter. If the sight of the whip were necessary to remind
the poor slaves of their liability to corporal punishment, it
would suffice as well for that purpose to plant it before them
in the field, as to put it in the driver's hand. Nay, much
better ; for as the driver's station is in the rear, it must be in
general unseen by them during their work.

The same idle pretence has elsewhere taken a different, and
perhaps still more inconsistent turn, though on what may
possibly be supposed better authority. Mr. Dwarris in his
pamphlet, called " The West India Question," says, " the cart-

■ r. 4G, 7.

btj which Slave Laboio^ is enforced. 207

" whip, either as an instrument of punishment, or as a sym-
*' bol of authority, has grown out of use. The cat-o'nine-tails
" which is used in the British army, is substituted for it."*

Where and when was this substitution, and this disuse ?
and upon what evidence does this public functionary hazard
such assertions? Certainly he cannot speak from his own
experience or observation ; for he closed his circuit through
the different islands as a commissioner in January, 1824,'|'
and has not, as I understand, since visited the West Indies ;
and it appears undeniably from the authorities I have quoted,
among others from the reluctant, but candid admissions of
Mr. De laBeche, a brother planter of the same island, Jamaica,
who was there till the end of 1824, and published here in
1 825, that the use of the cart- whip, not as a sijmbol merely, but
as " a stimulus to labour" then continued to be " general
" among the planters of that colony. With very few excep-
" tio/is, the drivers on Jamaica estates, carry either whips or
** cats; on some they are little used," &c.;|:

Is still more recent evidence desired ? A Jamaica news-
paper, the Watchman, of December oth, 1829, nearly the
latest date of any accounts from that island, is this moment
laid on my table, while I am correcting the proof of the pre-
sent sheet for press ; and I extract from it the following para-
graph.— " That the whip is still in use on some estates in
" Jamaica, we fear is but too true ; but on the other hand,
" we are glad to say that some estates have abolished the
" system of corporal punishment altogether ; and these plant-
" ations, we are informed, yield as fair returns to the pro-
" prietors as when conducted on the old execrable system.
" Some of the estates to which we refer are those of Mr. Wild-
" man and Mr. De la Beche.'" No others are specified ; and
those who know the pre-eminent characters in point of hu-
manity of both these proprietors, will be at no loss to conjec-
ture the cause. They had both within a few years visited
Jamaica, for the sake of witnessing and improving the condi-
tion of their slaves.

« P. 16. + Tliii-d Report, 94.

X Notes, &c. p. 20. And see the quotation, supra, p. 203, 4.

208 Of the cruel and pernicious Means

As to the substitution of the cat for the whip, Mr. Dwarris
doubtless had never read the debates in the Jamaica Assem-
bly, in December, 1826, though they were republished in
several of our own newspapers,* or he would have known, that
this very substitution, which he represents as actually made,
in terms of universal import, was then proposed and power-
fully advocated to no purpose; being rejected by a majority
of 28 to 12, in that most respectable of West India assem-
blies.

Mr. Dwarris, like most of his fellow-labourers, takes care
in mentioning the cat-o'nine-tails, to tell us " that it is used
" in the British army." If he could add, that it is used on
the backs of innocent soldiers, and of their wives and daughters
too, at the discretion of the drummers, and to quicken the
privates in working for the profit of the officers, by whom
alone its use could be controuled, the two cases would have
some similarity ; but, otherwise, the precedent of our flog-
ging convicted thieves in our gaol-yards, or at the cart's-tail,
would have been equally to his purpose.

The allusion, however, when coming from the pen of this
planter-commissioner, is not without its use. The idle and
hackneyed palliation manifests in what spirit he reports, and
writes. The stress laid on the alleged substitution, will also
enable those who reason as well as read, to estimate the sin-
cerity of the pretence, that the carrying the whip in the field
is merely symbolical, and meant only to operate on the ima-
gination of the slaves. If so, where would be the boasted im-
provement ? As a symbol, the cart-whip would be not less
harmless, and from long-formed associations of ideas, far
more efficacious, than the cat. Aye, and in its true use more
merciful ; for the report of the whip in the rear often suffices
without its smart ; whereas the cat can admonish only by its
actual inflictions.

My readers will probably think am mis-spending their time
by these comments, after citing so much direct and decisive
evidence as to the actual and still existing practice; especially
as I have shewn them,' that the pretences I am combating

* Tliey are given from the Jamaica newspapers in the Anti-Slavery Re-
porter, No. 21.

hy which Slave Labour is enforced. 209

were advanced with equal confidence forty years ago. But
strong facts require strong proofs ; and it is, I feel, a fact
requiring no ordinary force of evidence, that the practice is of
the utmost notoriety throughout the British West Indies, while
thus publicly denied in England, by the respectable authorities
I have cited ; especially that of the St. Vincent's Council and
Assembly. I will not, therefore, abstain from adducing some
further cotemporary evidence, given by the most zealous
partizans and accredited advocates of the sugar-colonies at
large.

And first, that of Alexander M'Donnell, Esq. secretary to
the committee of the inhabitants of Demarara, an author, from
his talents, as well as from the official character in which he
writes, of no small account. In his work, entitled " Consi-
deratiotis on Negro Slavery," 8cc. t this gentleman notices,
among other topics, the driving method of coercion ; and does
he countenance his fellow-labourer of the same colony, Mr.
McQueen, or the St. Vincent legislators, or Mr. Dwarris, by
denying its existence ? So much the contrary, that he em-
ploys his most strenuous efforts to reconcile the acknowledged
fact of its continuance, with that pretence, to support which
is the main drift of his work, namely, that slavery is in a
state of great and progressive improvement.

The whole of his ninth chapter is systematically and elabo-
rately devoted to that end. He distinguishes for the purpose
four stages in the supposed progress of amelioration, or rather
four distinct states of slavery; for as to the first, he admits
it to be the extremity of unmitigated oppression, that which
exists in colonies still supplied by the slave trade. The se-
cond, he says, " presents a very great amelioration, as the
" supply by traffic is stopped, and the slaves have to be reared,
" instead of being purchased ;" from which he plausibly,
however untruly, infers a great improvement in their
treatment. This, which upon his own premises is the first
advance in their condition, he maintains to have already
taken place. The third state, is the siibstitutioti of task
work for the driving whip; and to this he confesses, that

* See supra, p. 25.
VOL. 11. P

210 Of the cruel ami pernicious Means

they have not yet arrived ; and attempts to apologize for
it, on the very ingenious pretext, that reformation is rendered
unsafe by the only means which can possibly produce it ;
the interposition of the mother country.

But let me give his own words. " Seventeen years have
" not elapsed since the abolition of the slave trade ; and so
" great has been the improvement, that I regard the negroes
" in the West Indies at nearly at the end of what I have termed
*' the second state of slavery. They can participate in the
*' full enjoyment of physical comforts." — (Would to God that
this were true ! The shocking mortality in that very colony of
all the inhabitants of which this gentleman is the official
organ too clearly attests the contrary.) " They, however,"
he adds, "are not yet so far advanced as to perform their labour
" without the presence of a coercing power : this desirable object
" has been unavoidably delayed, from an unfortunate notion
" which has taken possession of their minds, that it is con-
" trary to the wish of those in authority in this country, that
" they should work at all. Could this fatal delusion be re-
" moved, together with the injurious effects resulting from
" intemperate discussion, I confidently predict, that in a very
" short time they would attain the third state," i. e. an exemp-
tion from driving ; or to use the author's own words, " whejt
" the whip that most repulsive characteristic of slavery no longer
" is used as a stimulus to labour.'^'

I will not digress so far as would be necessary to illustrate
the modesty of this excuse for the continuance of driving by
this organ of the committee of all the inhabitants of Demarara.
I will only ask, if the negroes there, are under the influence
of the delusion stated, (which I believe to be just as true as
the boldest of the extravagant fictions I am refuting,) who
inspired them with it ? who, but those who told them every
day in their resolutions, published in every newspaper of the
colony, and fatally in one instance led them to believe, that
the mitioations of their state recommended by the British
Government actually meant emancipation ?

If, indeed, the views of this writer are correct, the slaves

See the wliole of Cliapter IX., and jiartirularly p. 204 fo 207

(n/ whkh Slave Labour is enforced. 211

might have lield the notion he ascribes to them, without mis-
take ; for he reasons elaborately to prove, that the Trinidad
order, which forbids the use of the whip for " coercing labour,"
virtually amounts to emancipation. He deduces from what
he calls a strict analysis of the order, the conclusion, that
" the tvhip is not to be used at any time for the purpose of coercing
" the negroes to work ; and if such," he adds, " were its in-
** tention, the result must be considered as emancipation at
" once.'" It is true, he afterwards admits, that this con-
struction is not consistent with the spirit of the order ; and
that " it was intended merely to express, that the whip was
" not to be used on the spot as an instrument of compelling
" the negroes by its exhibition to perform the labour." But
is he content with the regulation even in that qualified sense ?
By no means ; not even as it respects the women! Adopting
this interpretation, he maintains still the impracticability of
reconciling a disuse of the driving-whip, with the " con-
" tinuance of the present system, as society is constituted in
" the West Indies," and this I freely admit to him ; for the
present system, as I have shewn, is to exact from the unfortu-
nate slaves of both sexes, a most cruel and destructive excess
of labour, such as the self-preservatory resistance of oppressed
nature will not permit them to yield, except to the irresistible
force of brutal coercion .

*' This compulsion," he adds, " is the characteristic dis-
" tinction, the unavoidable attendant, and beyond all coni-
^ parison the most repulsive feature of slavery. Deeply, in-
" deed, should I rejoice if nuj experience would warrant me in ad-
" mitting, that it could as yet be dispensed with.''

When Mr. M'Donnell represents this driving method, as
'' the characteristic distinction, and the unavoidable attendant
" of slavery," he must be ignorant, or suppose his readers to
be so, of what slavery was, and is, in antient and modern Eu-
rope, in Africa, and in the East, where driving was never
known,* and must have strangely forgot what the practice is
in many cases, even in those sugar colonies of which he was

Soo my forinff voUinu-, [).4G., and in various othor places.
H 2

212 Of t lie cruel ami pernicious Means

the oflficial organ; for if negroes will not work without a driver
behind them, how are their separate labours performed, when
they are dispersed for the picking of grass, or when they are
employed at the mill and copper-holes, and in the boiling-
house ?

They are driven only when they are employed in gang ;
for then only can the presence of one or two whips impel a
numerous body. To assign a driver to every isolated indi-
vidual^ or to a few labourers in each detached operation at
the works, would be to sacrifice labour itself to the means of
its compulsion. This "characteristic," therefore, " of slaverj/''
is lost, this " unavoidable attendant" of it, is avoided, even
by the sugar-planter himself, whenever his own interest or
convenience demand the laying it aside. There is no present
impending whip to operate " in terrorem" in some of the most
essential parts of the business of the plantation ; and yet that
business is done ; and yet the planters would persuade us,
that without a present whip nothing can be done in the
field.

That so much would not be done without it I am far indeed
from meaning to deny. This is the true and only cause of
its being so tenaciously retained.

Here let me pause, and request the reader's attention to the
general character of this controversy as it is maintained on
the part of the colonies. There is no part of their system, the
reader now I trust sees, however flagrant and notorious, that
they scruple to deny the existence of, whenever it suits their
convenience. Has it been decisively proved against them,
has it been publicly confessed by their own partizans and
witnesses, and by their legislative bodies, even in cotemporary
reports ? their intrepid contempt of truth is not at all im-
paired : their next controversial piece boldly re-asserts the
same convicted and repudiated falsehoods ; and not only so,
but arraigns the veracity and integrity of those who have
presumed to quote against them their own admissions.

They add, as I have before observed, the fraudulent artifice
of leaving unnoticed the quotations themselves. In my re-
marks on this driving method in my former volume, and in
earlier publications, I cited some of the very authorities here
presented to my readers, especially that of Dr. Collins; and

hij wlikh S/ace Labour is enj'oiced. 213

to the credit of none of them has any of my op|jonents ven-
tured ever to object. Yet that broad denial of the driver's
authority, and of the whole practice of driving which I have
cited from Mr. M'Queen, is ushered in by him with the fol-
lowing exclamation, " When will the anti-colonial furty tell
" the truth, the ichole truth, and nothing hut the truth I Never
" while they can substitute falsehood or misrepresentation for it.
And proceeding to quote a statement that " the slaves whe-
" ther male or female are driven to hard labour by the im-
** pulse of the cart-whip;" he subjoins, " this is either tvholli/
"false or the facts are misrepresented. The slaves are not driven
** to their work," Sfc. as in my former quotation.

In what other case were men ever heard with patience, not
to say with favour, after the facts they solemnly denied have
been proved under their own hands, or from their own lips ?
But the case of the poor slaves of the West Indies is unpa-
ralleled in all its circumstances. Their own mouths are gagged
by tremendous laws, and more tremendous manners. Their
voluntary advocates, and their witnesses, are persecuted and
hunted down with calumny and clamour ; and their oppres-
sors are listened to with a strange credulity, in spite of every
demonstration that any human evidence, their own confessions
included, can afford of the truths they inconsistently deny.
The gross impostures that are exposed and confessed to-day
are brought forward with as much confidence to-morrow, as if
they had never been detected j and unhappily obtain credit
anew on the same exploded authorities.

To undeceive men who are resolved to be deceived, is a
vain attempt. There is a large part of the upper and middle
circles of this community, a formidably large one, to whose
eyes the light of truth on these subjects is too painful ever
to be admitted. But let me remind the rest of my country-
men, that if they wilfully resist conviction, when it is pressed
upon them by evidence beyond dispute, complaisance for a
West Indian friend or connection, will form no excuse with
Him who is the Searcher of hearts, and the equal Judge of the
whole earth. They will not be less guilty of that cruel op-
pression which they would not lend their aid to terminate, be-
cause they refused impartially to exercise the understandings

214 Of the cruel and peniiciuiis Means

he has piven them in distinouishino- between truth and
falsehood.

Those, let me add, who defend their conduct on premises
that they know to be false, virtually admit that it is not to be
fairly defended ; and, therefore, as I have demonstrated, not
only in respect of the driving method, but many of the es-
sential points both in the law and practice of slavery, the
utter falsehood of those defensive pretexts in which the colo-
nists could not be mistaken, I am entitled to maintain that
they are conscious of, and virtually confess the oppressive and
indefensible nature of the system in which they are engaged.
Those who can conscientiously side with them must differ in
moral judgment, not only with the accusers, but the accused.

Section IV. — The cruel and pernicioits nature and effects of
the practice stated and proved.

Having rescued this part of the case from bold misrepre-
sentation, and proved that the immoderate labour of the field-
negroes is still extorted by the driving-whip ; and not merely
by its terror, but by its actual inflictions, I proceed to point
out some of the pernicious effects. These have in part been
already incidentally noticed and proved ; but the miseries
resulting from a mode of private despotism not more repulsive
to the feelings of Englishmen, than remote from their experi-
ence, demand a distinct and full investigation.

Driving is the most peculiar characteristic of West Indian
slavery and, as I have always held, the most opprobrious part
of the system. I will here in the first place, transcribe my
own earliest public strictures on the subject, rather than
give them in a new form of expression. It will serve at least
to shew the consistency of my present views with those which
I submitted to the public nearly eight-and-twenty years ago.
Besides, in this instance, I might fairly contend, were it ne-
cessary, that some credit is due to those long since promul-
gated opinions, though I decline to claim it for the testimony,
of an avowed and zealous adversary of the system. When
any hypothesis, propounded and supported by reasoning
a priori, is found to agree with the predicted result of ex-

bi) which Slave Labour is enforced. 215

peiiments, not previously made, we feel that its truth is ren-
dered highly probable ; and on the same principles my views
of the terrible effects of the driving-whip might now claim
credit, for it was upon them that I foretold to the public
with the utmost confidence in March 1802, the indomitable
resistance of the negroes of St. Domingo to the extremest
efforts of Buonaparte, at a time when his inexorable purpose
to restore slavery in that island was sustained by the then
gigantic power of France, unopposed by any foreign enemy,
and devoted to that single object.

" Among the various powerful feelings, (I then said) which
" will combine a large community of negroes inured by a ten
" years' experience to the habits of freedom, with an aversion
" perfectly irreconcileable to their former state, there is one
" which claims particular attention. It is one which will pro-
" bably occasion much obstinacy in the attempt to refix their
" fetters ; while it creates an equal pertinacity of resistance
" I mean that antipathy to their former labours which has
" been already so visible in the negroes of St. Domingo.
" Man is naturally indolent, and impatient of bodily restraint.
'' Though spurred by his hopes and fears into activity, and
" often to the most ardent exertions, he is with diflaculty bent
" to the yoke of uniform and persevering labour. The sug-
" gestions of foresight, however, are very powerful impulses,
" especially when seconded by habit ; and the great Author of
" our nature has conferred on them a mild as well as a right-
*' ful dominion. When we bow to the golden sceptre of rea-
" son, obedience has many facilities, and its pains many mi-
" tigations. Nature is not thwarted more rudely than the
" rational purpose demands ; and the mind, while it urges on
" the material frame, cheers it in return with refreshing and
" invigorating cordials.

'* Look at the most laborious peasant in Europe, and if you
" please the most oppressed : he is toiling, it is true, from pain-
*• ful necessity; but it is a necessity of a moral kind, acting
" upon his rational nature ; and from which brutal coercion
" differs as widely as a nauseous drench in the mouth of an
" infant from the medicated milk of its mother.

"■ Is the impelling motive fear of want, or dread of a master's

216 Of the a uel and pernicious Means

" displeasure ? yet he sees on the other hand the approbation
" and reward attainable by exertions whereof the degree is at
" least for the moment spontaneous. Self-complacency al-
" leviates his toil ; and hope presents to his view the hearty
" well-earned meal, the evening fire-side, and perhaps the
" gratifications of the husband or the father, in promoting the
" well-being of those dearest to his heart. Is his work fa-
" tiguing ? he is at liberty at least to introduce some little va-
*' rieties in the modes, or breaks in the continuity of it, which
" give him sensible relief. He can rest on his spade, or stay
" the plow a moment in the furrow ; can gaze at a passing
" object; or stop a brother-villager to spend a brief interval in
" talk.

" To the reflecting mind these little privileges will not ap-
" pear unimportant, when compared with the hard and cheer-
" less lot of the field-negro. He is not at liberty to relax his
" tired muscles, or beguile his weariness, either by voluntary
" pauses in labour, or by varying its mode : he must work on
" with his fellow-slaves, let fatigue or satiety groan ever so
" much for a moment's respite, till the driver allows a halt.

" But far more deplorable is the want of all those animat-
" ing hopes, that sweeten the toil of the European peasant.
*' To the negro slave, driven to his work, his involuntary ex-
*' ertions, as they can plead no merit, can promise in general
" no reward. His meal will not be more plentiful, nor his cot-
" tage better furnished, by the fruits of his utmost toil. As
" to his wife and children, they can hardly be called his own :
" Whether the property of the same or a different owner, it is
" upon the master, not himself, that their subsistence and
" well-being depend.

" The negro, therefore, casts his hoe from no impulse but
" that of fear ; and fear brought so closely and continually
" into contact with its object, that we can hardly allow it
" to rise above brutal instinct, and call it natural foresight,
" without ascribing to the docility of the horse an equal
" elevation. The other great and pleasing spring of human
" action, hope, is entirely cut oft".

" When these peculiar circumstances are duly considered,
" the rooted aversion of the free negro to his former labours
" cannot excite surprise. It is unnecessary to suppose that

hij which Slave Labour is enforced. 217

" they were excessive in degree, for in their kind, they were
" too irksome to be by the most patient of our race con-
" tentedly endured, or remembered without abhorrence.
" Neither is it necessary to suppose that the impending lash
" was, in the ordinary routine of field-duty, often actually
" inflicted. The human team might, when well broken, move
" on so regularly, as to make the whip in the hand of a
" humane driver little more than a mere ensign of authority ;
" yet the sense of perpetual constraint and ever-goading
" necessity, would be much the same. The motive would
" still be instant fear, though producing from habit a re-
" gular and equable movement. It might be admitted,
** even without danger to the argument (though I am sorry
** to say not without doing violence to truth, as well as pro-
" bability), that this coarse actuation of the physical powers
" of the human frame by an external mind, interested in
" their effect, was in general not pushed to excess, but was
" an impulse as leniently and wisely regulated as that of
" reason, when guided by the sympathies of the soul with
** the same body to which nature has allied it. Nay, we
" might overlook the inevitable frequency of such excesses
" as masters of narrow or unfeeling minds may be expected
" to practice ; and suppose that, in the time or measure of
" work, avarice, armed with an unlimited power, never ex-
" acted too much, nor ever made too little allowance for oc-
" casional or particular weakness ; in other words, that while
" thrones in Europe too rarely find possessors fit to govern,
" the sceptre of a plantation falls into the hands of none but
" Antonines and Trojans ; still we should see in this manner
" of enforcing work, and in the general circumstances of
" West Indian bondage, enough to account for a strong an-
" tipathy in the breast of the enfranchised negro to his former
" state, and its attendant labours." *

Reasoning upon these premises, I predicted an event of
the French expedition against the Negroes of St. Domingo,
which appeared at the time not only highly improbable to
the European public, but hardly within the limits of pos-

* Crisis of the Sugar Colonies. Ilatchard, March, 1802, p. 38 — 52.

218 Of the cruel a)id pernicious Means

sibility. And yet how amply has the prediction been veri-
fied ! All that a colossal power, beneath whose sway Europe
lay prostrate, could do to frustrate it, was tried in vain. The
military prowess of France, the consummate perfidy of Buo-
naparte, his relentless vengeance, his atrocious barbarities,
unexampled in any former recorded crimes of man, were all
found to be impotent, when opposed in the breasts of the
devoted Haytians by their recollections of the driving-whip.

It will be perceived, on a comparison of the extract here
given from the Crisis of the Sugar Colonies, with the pas-
sages cited from Mr. M'Donnell, that my inferences would
be sufficiently supported even by that writer's admissions.
I did not assume, as he imagines his opponents to do, that
whipping was " incessantly inflicted." I did not reason even
on the incontestible fact of its great frequency ; but from that
ever impending power and terror of the whip, which he de-
fends, and I'epresents as essential to the system ; and I sub-
mit to the feelings, or rather to the cool judgment, of my
readers, whether this, were it all, would not be enough to
make such a mode of coercion not only degrading to human
nature, but in a high degree cruel and pernicious. I did not
even assume, for the purpose of my argument (though I as-
serted the fact, as I have ever done in all my writings on
slavery), that the quantum of labour enforced either by the
smart or terror of the whip was excessive ; but I have now
demonstrated that it really is so, and to the utmost possible
degree of relentless, avaricious oppression.

This fatal effect of such brutal coercion I have always regard-
ed, as by far the worst among the manifold mischiefs of which
the driving-whip is productive. It compels these devoted
victims of avarice to labour beyond their strength ; it is the
main source of the diseases to which they are subject ; it hur-
ries a large proportion of them prematurely to their graves ;
and by its effect on the women, prevents that native increase,
which would otherwise repair all the waste of life that the
other severities of the system occasion, among a race pre-
eminently hardy and prolific. Witness the often-attested,
well-proved, and, I believe, uncontested fact, that where
driving is not practised, the native slave population is always
found to increase.

l>ij rvhkh Slave Labour is enforced. 219

But the same oppressive effect of this mode of coercion is
the true cause of that pertinacity with which tlie sugar-plan-
ters maintain it. They admit, as we have seen, its offensive
character; they profess an earnest desire to abohsh it as a
theme of reproach with those whom they call their enemies ;
and yet, they obstinately refuse its abolition ; and why, but
because they know, that the same quantity of forced labour
cannot otherwise be obtained ?

I have already admitted, that the slaves will not work to
that extremity of exertion to which, not the presence of the
whip merely, but its painful inflictions, coupled with its in-
cessant terrors impel them ; but I maintain, that this efficacy
of the driving method, is the worst of its effects. It conduces
to the present profits of the planters ; but is unspeakably
cruel and destructive to the slaves.

But let us look more distinctly at the iniquities and the
miseries, directly and indirectly, produced by this practice,
which are greater than can be easily described or conceived.

We have seen what colonial writers have admitted, as to
the despotism, and the partiality with which the drivers are
apt to exercise their powers. " They are," according to Mr.
Stewart, " too generally hard-hearted, and partial in the
** minor punishments they are authorized to inflict. They may
" maltreat and persecute the unfriended slave against whom
*' they have a grudge."* " They have the use of the whip,"
says Dr. Collins, " at their discretion, and of course it is ad-
" ministered neither with impartiality nor judgment ; it is
" generally bestowed with rigour on the weakest negroes of
" the gang, and on those who are so unfortunate as not to be
" in favor with this sub-despot."t " The driver," says Mr.
De la Bec/ie, " has the power of inflicting punishment at his
" own discretion upon those who may appear to him to be
" idle ; a power as may be easily imagined liable to much
" abuse."!

These, be it always remembered, are not the statements of
anti-slavery writers, but of planters and apologists of the sys-
tem ; and what appalling accounts do some of them give of

Supra, p. :204. f Supra, p. 201. J Ibid. 204.

220 Of the cruel and pernicious Means

the effects ! "^The whip," says Dr. Collins, " is often em-
" ployed to a degree, which by inducing a callosity of the
" parts, destroys their sensibility, and renders its further ap-
" plication of little avail ;"* and Mr. Beckford makes a similar
remark, " When a negro becomes familiarized to the whip, he
'* no longer holds it in terror."f

What, I beg the compassionate reader to reflect, must be
the sufferings of the poor beings before it comes to this? How
exquisite must have been the tortures endured by the reiterated
incisions of the tremendous cart-whip, the protracted miseries
of the wide excoriations, the long sufferings of the healing
process, often interrupted in its progress by new flagellations,
and by continued labours in the meantime, before the human
frame can have so completely lost its sensibility, as no longer
to shrink from the most torturous mode of punishment that
cruelty has, perhaps, ever inflicted without speedy destruction
of life.

I do not mean, indeed, to ascribe such shocking effects
wholly, or chiefly, to the punishments of which the drivers
are the arbiters. I understand the authors 1 have cited as
including in the causes of them, and for the most part having
directly in view, the more heavy flagellations of a penal kind,
inflicted at the homestall by the immediate order of the ma-
nager or overseer ; but beyond doubt, the far more numerous
inflictions of the drivers during the work, must tend power-
fully to the progressive insensibility they speak of; and what
is, perhaps, of more importance, to the moral insensibility of the
masters, and to the severe punishments they ordain. A slave
accustomed to feel the smart of the driver's whip for slackness,
whether real or imputed, in his ordinary work, is not thought
likely to be deterred from repeating offences deserving punish-
ment, by a slight or moderate infliction of the same corporal
pain ; and women also lose in such cases, the compassion due
to their sex, from a knowledge, that their natural timidity and
sensibility have been in great measure worn off by the harsh
discipline of the field. Hence doubtless, in no small degree,
the extreme severity with which the cart-whip is so often ap-

* Ibid.

f Remarks on the situation of Negroes in Jamaica, p. 40.

by %vhuh Slave Labour is enforced. 221

plied by order of the manager or overseer ; and for offences
commonly of no greater magnitude than desertion, or even
truantcy of a day's duration. Many managers think it not too
much in such cases to inflict a cart-whipping, in its regular and
terrible form, on women as well as men, to the full extent of the
thirty-nine lashes allowed by law, and even to order, that
they shall be severely applied ; which amounts, perhaps, to
torture as intense as the human frame is well capable of feel-
ing.* Such masters might truly, however inadequately,
allege in their defence, that it would be idle to order a few
lashes, when the fugitive or truant might probably have
escaped as many from the driver's hands, even by a day's ab-
sence from the field. The exemplary effect would be wholly
lost ; and the offender, if long absent, would in consequence of
the fault, avoid not only the pains of hard labour, but lessen,
perhaps, on the whole, his or her sufferings by the whip.

Some of the apologists of the driving method tell us, that
without it, punishments by the master's order for neglect of
work, would be more frequent. Possibly they might for some
time ; at least if the master attempted to exact, in the mode
of task-work, the same extent of daily toil as the driving-
whip had before enforced ; but he would probably soon find this
impracticable ; and be glad to relieve himself by moderation in
the tasks, from the endless and' fruitless drudgery of sitting
in judgment every day, between a large proportion of his
slaves and the accusing drivers, now in truth become only
superintendants of their work. The evil might thus cure
itself; and if the punishments were more frequent in the
mean time, they would for the reasons assigned, be less
severe. They would also be more equal and impartial; for
the master's interest, if not his feelings, would be on the side

* I will not here cite any of the numberless proofs to be found of such
severity in the official accounts laid before, and printed by, parliament,
for cruelty in punishments is one of the topics I have declined, though
obliged here and elsewhere to advert to it as incidental to the subject of
labour. Whoever wishes for full satisfaction, as to the frequency of such
severities, need only read the extracts from those parliamentary documents
given in the Anti-slavery Reports. But in an appendix which I have pro-
mised upon other views, the above statements will be sufficiently verified.

222 Of the cruel (Did peitikious Means

of equality and justice. He would not have like those sub-
despots, the drivers, among their fellow-slaves, connexions,
and attachments, and rivalships, and enmities to warp him,
either in the apportionment of labour to individuals, or the
punishment of their defaults.

Reasonably do those planters whom I have cited and have
yet to cite, as to the ordinary conduct of the driver, consider
the abuse of his power as a natural consequence of his au-
thority. Their express testimony was not necessary to prove
it ; for it would be strange to suppose, that men destitute of
religious and moral education, are guarded by native feelings
of humanity and justice, against those abuses to which arbi-
trary power in the best of hands commonly seduces its pos-
sessors ; and that, those feelings too are proof against the ob-
durating influence of habit, among men whose daily and
hourly business it is to impose harsh restraints, and inflict
severe punishments with their own hands, upon their fellow-
creatures.

We expect no such incorruptible virtue in our public exe-
cutioners or gaolers ; nor are we much surprised, when we
read reports of the apathy with which men, even in a liberal
profession, regard the cruel treatment of pauper lunatics, long
placed under their own immediate charge ; still less at the
obduracy of the keepers they employ. Where then is that
moral charter to be found, that exempts the enslaved negro-
driver, from the corrupting influence of habits still more inve-
terate, and more directly opposed to every benevolent feel-
ing ? Certainly not, if our planters are to be believed, in their
African extraction, or sympathy with their own injured race ;
for we are incessantly told, though 1 confess untruly, that
they make, when free, the worst of masters ; and even in
slavery are tyrants to each other.

" That negroes are cruel to one another," says Mr. Beck-
ford, '* cannot be denied ; they will assassinate without com-
" punction," &:c. " I have observed that new negroes are par-
" ticularly fond of power ; and will exert it as if accustomed
" to severity ; and when raised to the authority of drivers, will
" be more despotic and inhuman than the Creoles are."*

* Ueniui'ks, ^v.c. p. 87-8.

hij ivhich Slave Labour is enforced. 223

The distinction may be doubted ; but that both are cruel, and
their abuses not likely to be restrained by the overseers, he
shews in several parts of his work.

" I am sorry to observe," he says " that punishments in
" Jamaica, are often inflicted upon the bodies of the negroes
" without discretion, and very frequently rather to gratify re-
" venge, than for the sake of example. An overseer who is
" addicted to drink, will not make any discrimination in the
" absence of reason, between the generally laborious and ac-
" cidentally idle, and there are drivers upon some plantations
" rvho ivill sleep over the work of the negroes committed to their
^' charge ivhen the white people are absent, but who will use the
" ivhip tvithout necessity/ as soon as one shall appear in sight.
" I am willing to believe that it is sometimes meant as a
" warning; but why make a mockery of punishment, or suffer
" that to be considered as sport to an able negro, that intimi-
" dates and consequently becomes pain to those who are sick
*' and weakly ? I am convinced that custom and bad exam-
" pie have a fatal influence upon the conduct of the genera-
" lity of white people in Jamaica ; many of whom imagine
" that the appearance of discipline is a spur to labour, and
" that negroes will not work unless roused by the sound
" of the whip."*

I hope my readers will remember that this was written by
a defender of slavery, and the slave-trade : and at a time too
when the power of the drivers to use the whip, was as boldly
denied by some eminent planters, as it is by the legislators of
St. Vincent's, and by the accredited champions of all the co-
lonies, in the present day.

Mr. Stewart, after the passage which I have cited from his
wook, (supra, p. 133,) as to the partiality and injustice of the
driver, adds, " He makes a shew, by way of saving appear-
" ances of equal severity to both, (i. e. to a slave whom he
" favours, and one whom he dislikes,) . but by the dextrous
" command he has of the whip, he has it in his power to in-
" flict either a very slight, or a very severe punishment. On
*•' such occasions, the persecuted slave is too often afraid to

Romnrk<, JvC. p. 41, 4'2, in the notes.

224 Of the cruel and pernicious Means

" complain to his master; thinking it would lead to renewed
*^ persecutions ; and though there are doubtless men in the
" situation of overseers who would not permit such barbari-
*' ties were they aware of them, it is equally true that there
" are others who will support the authority of their drivers,
" however iniquitously exercised.*

It is not from harshness or violence of temper, alone that
these coarse and degraded agents of despotic authority, are
prone to abuse their power among the negroes whom they
drive. They have not only their friends, and their enemies,
their mistresses, and their rivals in the gang, but fellow-slaves
who sometimes work for them on Sundays, or carry to mar-
ket articles they have for sale; while others, no doubt, may
have been found unwilling so to entitle themselves to favour ;
and can it be doubted that such considerations often unfairly
impel or withhold the lash, while they are following the poor
drudges in the field ?

By no conceivable means can injustice and cruelty in the
exercise of the driver's discretionary powers, while they are
suffered to exist, be controuled. For this also I have quoted
the authority of Mr. Stewart. But how can it be questioned
by any thinking mind ? Among all the idle pretences by
which the odious system has been palliated and disguised,
there is none more self-evidently preposterous than that the
manager or overseer, unavoidably absent from the field during
great part of the day, can judge between the drivers and the
driven, so as to check partiality and oppression in each indi-
vidual instance. If the poor slave, whipped up repeatedly
during the work, for not throwing his hoe with sufficient ce-
lerity or momentum, were bold enough to complain on return-
ing to the homestall, against a man who is to drive him again
in the morning, and during every day of his life, how is he to
prove his case ?

Let it be supposed. that his fellow-labourers are so daringly
generous as to be willing to support the charge ; yet how
can this testimony avail him ? They were each intent on

* Stewart's View of the Past and Present State of Jamaica, App. 346, 347.
t Supra, p. 132.

by which Slave Labour is enforced. 225

his own particular share of the work ; and can no more
determine wlietlicr the complainant was in fault, than a
private soldier in line upon parade, whether the other men
shouldered or presented their arms with precision, or dressed
with due correctness. The accused driver himself is the only
competent witness; and were the statement of the injured
slave to prevail against his denial of the charge, this species
of subordination, so essential in the eyes of our planters, could
not possibly be maintained.

The idea of a manager holding a tribunal at the end of the
day's work to hear and try the complaints of fifty or a hundred
negroes, or as many of them as may think the whip had been
in some instances needlessly applied to their backs, is prepos-
terous. It may serve, like the other extravagant fables of the
colonists, to deceive European readers, who will not stop to rea-
son on these painful subjects ; but a few moments of reflection
will suffice to shew that it is quite incredible. If managers and
overseers were the very reverse of what they in general are, if
they were the most intelligent and industrious of mankind, such
judicial functions would be more than enough to occupy all
their time, and exhaust all their energies ; whereas the duties
they are really expected to perform, are confessedly fully equal
to, if not surpassing, any ordinary powers. Committing as they
unavoidably do, the details of the field work, implicitly to the
drivers, their general inadequacy to the various important la-
bours which belong to the agricultural and manufacturing bu-
siness of a plantation, and the government of its'multudinous
gang, is nevertheless universally admitted.

It may be useful here to give a few specimens of what my
antagonists state as to the great personal consequence of the
drivers ; and as to the character of those white agents by
whom they are said to be controuled.

Let me quote in the first place, The Jamaica Planter's
Guide, published in 1823, by " Mr. Thomas Roughlej/, nearly
" twenty years a sugar planter in Jamaica." So he is de-
scribed in his title page; and his readers will find him a
thorough-paced defender of the system he had so long admi-
nistered. He is, to use a reigning phraseology, a perfect
ultra \n his attachment to the cause of slavery ; and in his
enmity to all who oppose it. This writer says " The most

VOL. 11. Q

226 Of the cruel and pernicious Means

" important personage in the slave population of an estate is
" the head driver. He is seen carrying with him the emblems
" of his rank and dignity, a polished staff, or wand with
" prongy crooks on it to lean on, and a short handled tangible
" whip ; his office combining within itself a power, derived
'* principally from the overseer, of directing all conditions of
" slaves relative to the precise work he wishes each gang or
" mechanic to undergo or execute, &c. There are so many
" points to turn to, so many occasions for his skill, vigilance,
" steadiness and trustworthiness, that the selection of such
" a man fit for such a place requires circumspection and an
" intimate knowledge of his talents and capacity. A bad or
" indifferent head driver, sets almost every thing at variance,
" injures the negroes, and the culture of the estate : He is
" like a cruel blast that pervades every thing, and spares no-
*' thing," &c.*

This experienced manager proceeds to shew us the various
evils resulting from the faults of the drivers; but among them
we do not find any mention of troublesome appeals to the
manager or overseers ; and his language plainly shews that it
is not from the complaints of the slaves, but from the effects
only on their disposition and conduct, that the abuses of
driving are to be discovered. '* When the drivers are ill-
" disposed, he, the overseer (which in Jamaica means the
" head manager), will perceive the negroes likewise so : the
" work will not be carried on agreeably to his dictates :
*' things suffer in general : the slaves run away, or are in-
" clined to be turbulent, &.C. : they even aim," he adds, " at
" the existence of the white people. The root, then, of this
*' evil must be struck at, and the head driver and his abettors
" sent to public punishment."*

The words of an apologist cannot more intelligibly shew
that the pretence of an intimate daily superintendance and
controui of this ** sub-despot," as Dr. Collins calls him, in
the particular cases of oppressed individuals, is utterly un-
founded. He is known only by his general and aggregate
fruits ; the general ill-will, discontent, and despair of the

Jamaica Planters' Guide, p. 1. f Ibid. 8Q, 83.

hi^ which Slave Labour is enforced. 227

uafortunate gang, when his tyranny is pushed to excess, are
the only indications of their sufferings that can commonly
meet the master's notice. Injured individuals, instead of
daring to complain of the driver, run away ; and like a
bad minister, or rather like a cruel gaoler, the only remedy
is his removal, or punishment, when his general maladminis-
tration becomes so visible as to call for that which is a kind
of revolution on the estate.

Is it likely, that even in such extreme cases, the remedy is
often applied, or that the drivers are controuled even when
complaints can be tried ? To determine that question, it will
be useful next to shew what my opponents confess as to the
ordinary character of managers or overseers.

Let us mark the candid avowal of Mr. De la Beche on this
subject : — " I by no means wish to state that the overseers
** always lean to the side of justice, believing that not one-
" half of them are qualified to wield the powers that under
" existing circumstances must necessarily be entrusted to
" them."*

*' If an overseer," says Mr. Stewart, " be a man of educa-
" tion and feeling, and that feeling has not been extinguished
" by habits certainly not calculated to soften the heart or
" improve the manners, he has it in his power to impart
" much good in his situation. He may soften the hardships
" of the slaves, and render their toils more easy ; he may
" hear and redress their complaints, &c. It would be a
" happy circumstance for the slaves if such characters were
" more common than they are among this class of persons;
" but the chief ambition of too many is rather who shall
" make the largest crops, the finest quality of sugar, &c.,
" than who shall govern the slaves placed under their care
** with the greatest moderation and humanity."

As to the ordinary " education and feelings" of the overseers
or head managers in Jamaica, the same writer is painfully
instructive ; but his statements and remarks are too long
for insertion here. They extend from the 188th to the 195th
page of his work, and are well worthy of the attention of such

* See the quotation at large, supra, p. 74.
Q 2

228 Of the cruel and peniicious Means

readers as desire to have just ideas of the situation of plan-
tation slaves, so far as respects the character of their im-
mediate masters, in the very ordinary case of the owners'
absence in Europe. The general effect is, that the men who
lill the situations of overseers in Jamaica are promoted to
them from those of book-keepers, in which they must pre-
viously have served five or six years; and the account which
he gives of the situations, treatment, and habits of the latter,
during that long novitiate, is in the highest degree revolting
and appalling. The negro slaves themselves are hardly more
despised than these " voluntary slaves," as Mr, Stewart ra-
ther inaptly calls them ; inaptly, because they are commonly
poor ignorant lads, sent out from the mother country under
indentures, their will to enter into which preceded all know-
ledge of the degraded and miserable state they were to be
sent to. The appellation " book-keepei" is strangely *' mis-
placed ;" for as the same author observes, " a man who had
•' never seen an account book in his life, may yet be a very
" expert book-keeper." But it probably serves, and was no
doubt intended to do so, like the tricks of a recruiting Ser-
jeant, to seduce into the plantation bonds many a raw strip-
lino-, who would have spurned at the more proper name of a
white negro-driver.

Mr. Stewart thinks, and 1 agree with him, that such of
them as have received but little education, who "have been
*• accustomed from their earliest years to a rustic and drudg-
" ino hfe, who in short have directed the plough, or wielded
" the pitchfork, in their native country, are not so much to
" be sympathised with, as those who have been liberally
" educated."

But I doubt, whether he is right in supposing, as he seems
to do, that liberality of education in these unfortunate youths,
would qualify better for the office of overseers, such of them as
may live to attain it; for in proportion to the refinement of
former feelings and ideas, must probably be not only the pain,
but the corrupting and obdurating effects of the situation to
which they are forced to submit, and the harsh duties they
have to perform. The more violence that is done to liberal
and virtuous feelings at the outset, the greater will be their
ultimate ruin. Mr. Stewart, indeed, admits, that if the better

h[l wJtich Slaue Labour is enforced. 229

educated youth, docs not find resource and consolation during
his painful and degrading service, by reading at his solitary
hours, he is likely *' to contract low depraved habits," to re-
nounce his better feelings, and " become seared loith a reckless
" apathj/." Now, that he should resort sufficiently to such
an antidote, is, upon our author's premises, not very likely ;
for he tells us, that the poor book-keeper has little time that
he can possibly give to reading ; that even Sunday is not alto-
gether his own ; and that " it would be unpardonable to allow
" books to interfere with the business of the estate."

The colonial advocates often appeal to our national feelings,
by asking, whether it is probable, that in a white population,
constantly recruited from this country, the slave-masters should
generally be found to have left their native humanity and libe-
rality on this side of the Atlantic ? At the same time we are
told, not very consistently, that Europeans very often, I think,
by some it is said, genera/lj/, are more severe masters than the
Creole whites. I believe, that this latter plea, is not wholly
unfounded in fact ; but the answer to both is, that before
Europeans become slave-masters on a plantation, they are
long, howsoever reluctantly at first, trained and hackneyed
to the administration of its odious discipline ; and that, when
virtuous propensities are subdued by temptation, and yield to
habitual controul, it is natural in this, as in other cases, that
the moral victim should not only lose his former sensibility,
but pass beyond others in the vices he once abhorred. The
more force it requires to strain the bow, the further the arrow
flies. We are not surprised to find in women, who have
thrown off, from strong temptations perhaps at first, the re-
straints of their native modesty and virtue, a degree of im-
pudence and profligacy, beyond that of the coarser sex.

Whatever be the causes, the fact, that West India overseers
are too commonly of a harsh and unfeeling character, is at-
tested beyond dispute. To the authorities that I have cited,
I might add many more. Even iMr. Roughley, that most de-
termined defender of the general system, sufficiently discloses
that truth. His censures on the overseers, indeed, are chiefly
pointed at their morose and tyrannical conduct towards the
unfortunate book-keepers ; but if it could be doubted, whether
the same disposition must be felt by their still more helpless

230 Of the cruel and pernicious Means

dependents with black skins, one of his own incidental re-
marks would remove it ; " his temper is soured by frequent
" casualties of this nature, (i. e. by frequent breaches with
" his white assistants,) and vents itself often with terrible
" consequences upon the slaves under him.'"* He speaks, in-
deed, of such men chiefly, as *' Overseers, of the old school;"
but while he illustrates their savage conduct by recent and
shocking instances, he does not tell us, that any new school is
generally established ; and his anxious advice to absent pro-
prietors, to change their ordinary choice of attornies and other
agents, sufficiently betrays his consciousness of the leverse.
The whole of his long chapter on plantation attornies and
agents is, on this and other subjects, highly instructive ; at
least when read as the language of a man, who had been for
twenty years an administrator of the system, and whose
anxious endeavour it is to reconcile it to the feelings of the
British public.

But let me not deal unfairly with the overseers and managers.
It is not solely, nor chiefly, to misconduct on their parts, that
the cruelties of the driving system are to be ascribed. These
strictures on their characters are cited only to shew, that a
humane controul on their part, of the driver's conduct in the
ordinary use of the coercing whip, which I have shewn to be
for the most part impracticable, is not likely to be often at-
tempted, at a grievous expense of their time and ease, even to
the small extent in which such controul is possible. Without
even taking into account the indolence and love of ease, to
which men of all descriptions are proverbially prone in that
country, enough has been shewn of the case, to make such
very onerous humanity hopeless. Implicit confidence in the
drivers, is the manager's or overseer's only easy chair ; and he
must be a man of very active benevolence, who should be
willing to resign it, as often as would be necessary to decide
such differences even as are capable of fair investigation,
between the drivers and the driven. To encourage com-
plaints, would be to make his office more laborious than that
of the driver himself.

* Jamaica Planters' Guide, p. 51. f See Chapter I. throughout.

hy which Slave Labour is etif arced. 23 1

Besides, the overseers are not generally at liberty to consult
their own feelings, but are impelled to exact such an excess
of labour as is incompatible with humane restrictions on the
driver's coercive discipline. " There are not wanting attornies,"
says Mr. Stewart, " who, anxious to outdo their predecessors
" in the magnitude of the crops, and thereby forward their
" own interest and reputation, too often act as a stimulus,
" instead of a restraint on this impolitic and unfeeling zeal of
" the overseers, by continually reminding them of the quan-
" tum of produce, and of work they expect."*

I wish this intelligent writer had not stopped here. He
might have shewn how the attornies, in their turn, are stimu-
lated to the same avaricious oppression by the proprietors
resident in this country, and their commercial consignees.

Why are the attornies remunerated in proportion only to
the quantities of sugar they consign? The general, and I
believe in Jamaica the only, reward of their services, is a
commission on the produce shipped. I think it is either a
guinea per hogshead, or 5 per cent. A premium on the pre-
servation, and native increase of the slaves, or even a draw-
back on the commissions when the deaths exceed the births,
would have widely different effects ; but I never heard of
any instance of such a humane departure from the general
practice; and believe, that no such exception to it is_any
where alleged.

Section V. — The only remedy for these mischiefs, compatible
with forced labour, is individual task-work.

Here I have to open a most lamentable, and at the same
time a most undeniable part of the case — the unjust and
cruel effects of a wholesale method of coercion, which like
the bed of Procrustes, levels almost all inequalities of health
and strength, or makes them sources of inevitable miseries,
at least to the weaker slaves.

Let the reader look back on my description of driving, as
extracted from my earliest publication on slavery, and on the

* Ibid. p. 188.

232 Of the cruel and pertiicioias Means

decisive authorities by which I have evinced its correctness ;
and he will see, that the want of discrimination between the
different deorees of strength of the individual labourers of both
sexes, driven forward together in line or file, is one of its most
prominent but essential mischiefs. If the standard of forced
exertion, in point of time and intensity, were reduced to the
capacity of the weakest, there might in this respect, be no
ground of complaint ; but I have shewn, that it is on the con-
trary, such, as without experience we should hardly believe,
the strongest could long endure.

Dr. Collins after confirming, as has been shewn, my stric-
tures on this cruel consequence of the driving method, nearly
in the very words I used, suggests to the planters a remedy,
or rather a palliative, which further marks the character of the
general practice. " In order that the weak may not work
" too much, nor the strong too little, it is advisable to di-
" vide your force into a greater number of sections or gangs,"
&c.*

Inadequate as this expedient must prove, the partial im-
provement has not been generally if any where adopted. It
appears from Mr. De laBeche and Mr. Stewart, and even from
Mr. Roughley's accounts, that the number of sections or gangs
now in use, is not greater than it was when Dr. Collins pub-
lished his valuable work.

Conscious that the remedy would be at best but partial. Dr.
Collins speaks favorably of the only effectual one, the disuse
of driving, and substitution of task-work, when possible; a
change which had been recommended by example in many
parts of the American continent. He shews how much it
would tend to encourage, as well as ease the labourers; whereas
nothing, as he observes, " can depress them more than a tire-
" some routine of duty, which presents no prospect of end,
" relief, or recompense. "f He regarded task-work, indeed, as
not inmost cases practicable ; though the reasons he assigns
for it, seem not very easy to comprehend, and even to be at

* Practical Rules, 176, &c. See extract, p. 55, 6, supra,
t Practical Rules, p. 179.

by which Slave Labour is enjurced. 233

variance with his own views in the context. But my readers
shall judge of his meaning from his own language.

" The misfortune is," he says, " that the rule is applicable
" only to a very few ; from the necessity of dividing our ne-
" groes, as above recommended, into several gangs, and the
" various kinds of work which they have respectively to exe-
" cute, and the fluctuation of their numbers from day to day
" by sickness or other circumstances, which rejects every idea
" of their labouring universally on such a system ; but when-
" ever it is found practicable in any case, it ought to be done,
" The several kinds of business assigned to the strong gang
" are of that description, and of course subject to such regu-
" lation, as you have the same power to execute the same
" service daily ; for should any of your strong gang fall sick,
" or give out at their work, you have the means of replacing
" them, by occasional draughts from your middle gang, which
** will contain some negroes robust enough to supply their
" place, until they return to their labour ; so as always to keep
'' up the number of holers."*

The solution of the apparent difficulty in these passages, I
conceive to be this : Dr. Collins had in view, when he recom-
mended task-work, the assessment of a daily portion of the
work required, not on each individual slave, but on the collective
gang. His habits as a planter, and long-resident colonist,
naturally led him to that use of the word ; for task- work is a
well-known term in the West Indies ; and means the perform-
ing a given portion of work by contract, when the slaves are
hired for the purpose, of a master who is not the owner of the
soil ; and it is chiefly in use in the laborious process of holeing,
which Dr. Collins appears clearly by the context to have had
chiefly in view. The owner of the slaves, commonly called a
** task-work,"or'* jobbing-gang," contracts to hole for a given
price, so many acres of land ; and our author probably meant,
that the great gang of the estate might be tasked collectively,
with adequate portions of the same species of work, to be ac-
complished in a limited time. But did he also mean, that the
driver's immediate coercion should be withdrawn ? If not.

Ibid. p. 178,9.

234 Of the cruel and pernicious Means

there would be little, if any, diminution of the evils, which he
wished to remove. The task-work gangs in use, are worked
under the contractor's own drivers ; and it is agreed on both
sides, that their condition is not better, but rather worse, than
that of the plantation slaves.

It is probably now of great practical importance to mark
well the distinction between collective, and individual task-
woik ; for in some of the colonies, where the crown has legis-
lative authority, driving is now prohibited by law ; and it is
said, that it is accordingly laid aside in practice, and task-
work adopted in its stead ; an innovation, the effects of which,
the planters will of course be desirous to depreciate. But it is
highly probable, not only from the long established use of the
term, but from the regard of managers to their own ease and
convenience, that where such a substitution has been made,
the tasks have been assessed, not on each individual slave,
but on the gangs that had usually worked together ; e. g. that
they should hole a particular cane-piece, or a certain propor-
tion of it, in a given time. Such a method cannot be ex-
pected to operate satisfactorily, or not to be attended with
some highly inconvenient effects ; for how are individuals to
enforce from each other their fair contributions to the accom-
plishment of the general task ?

It is not very uncommon for a small number of workmen in
this country, mutually to contract with their employer to
perform a given service by their united efforts for a common
reward ; as to cut down a field of hay, at a certain price per
acre ; but they are, or suppose themselves to be, of nearly
equal capacity ; and can depend on each other for equal exer-
tion, because a failure in it is what they would have power to
punish, if not in the division of the price, at least by reproach,
and by an exclusion from such associated undertakings in
future. But in a gang of slaves, of very unequal degrees of
strength, and whose union in work is neither by choice, nor of
brief duration, but imposed on them for hfe by authority they
cannot resist, there can be no security whatever for a fair and
equal contribution to the common task, though all may have
the same interest in obtaining by its speedy accomplishment
an earlier dismission from the field. Endless quarrels among

by which Slave Labour is eiij'orced. 235

themselves, and incessant appeals to the master, must be ex-
pected to ensue.

I am far from thinking, that the dismission of the Whip
from the field would not still be a benefit, especially when
use had taught them the advantages of fair and amicable
co-operation ; but it is individual task-vVork alone, impartially
and moderately assessed by the master, that can form such a
substitute for driving as to produce the proper effects, by
giving to every slave a fair and adequate interest in his or her
own exertions.

This, however, would impose new and onerous duties on
the managers and overseers ; and it was therefore, I presume,
that Dr. Collins seems not to have extended his views t6 so
important an improvement as that of individual task-work; for
he was fully impressed as appears in various parts of his work,
with the extreme difficulty to be encountered in every reforma-
tion of the established system, that would demand from its
white administrators much additional energy in the discharge
of their important functions ; or from the proprietors an ex-
pensive addition to the number of those important agents.
The allotting to each working individual in a gang of 150 or
200 slaves daily, or even weekly, his or her separate task,
and taking cognizance of its due performance' or neglect,
would certainly be a new burthen on the management of no
trivial amount, and such as that well-informed writer probably
thought it in vain to propose.

The dreadful alternative, hovv'ever, of adhering to the pre-
sent method of brutal coercion is such as it would be well
worth every sacrifice to avoid ; for it is not only an opprobrious
degradation of our species, and cruel injustice When applied to
innocent men, but largely and unavoidably destructive of their
health and lives.

One of its indisputably Cruel and murderous effects demands
particular notice, and has not hitherto, I think, met with the
attention it deserves. I mean the impossibility of r^'conciling
with the system, in a multitude of cases, the allowance of such
alleviations or temporary suspensions of labour to individuals,
as sickness or weakness may render necessary for the recovery
of health and the preservation of life.

Even in this temperate and healthy climate it is not uncom-

236 Of' the cruel ami pernicious Means

nion that languor, weariness, and debility, proceeding from no
apparent cause, are the first symptoms of a serious disease.
Hard working people of both sexes, sometimes find themselves
unfit to go to their ordinary work ; or are obliged during the
progress of it, to pause, sit down, or retire, from sensations that
they can ill explain ; though to resist them, might not only
be painful but dangerous. With men and women working
under a vertical sun, in a climate where the first sense of
disease is often but a brief prelude to its crisis, such cases
cannot but be very frequent ; yet, to allow the slaves to re-
main in their huts, or to suspend or quit their work in the
field, on the plea of weakness or weariness alone, would be
incompatible with the driving system. Such pleas would be
perpetually brought forward, if they were always or often to
prevail ; for that the poor people dislike the toil they are driven
to, and would always obtain a suspension of it if they could,
will hardly, I presume, be doubted.

Should any authorities be desired for such natural conse-
quences of forced labour, or to shew that fatal effects often un-
avoidably result from overruling the plea of weakness or sick-
ness when truly alleged, better evidence of both cannot be
desired than what has been furnished by that long-experienced
planter and physician, Dr. Collins.

" You must expect," says he, ** that your negroes, from a
" constant desire of sparing themselves, will under different
" pretexts, be for changing their divisions, and taking a sta-
" tion where they are required to do less, as you will find them
" all desirous of doing no more than they can avoid. You
" must necessarily check these attempts, unless you are satis-
" fied, that there is a real necessity for indulging them, by
" such evidence of their impaired strength, as you can no longer
" doubt."t

He is here speaking in reference to his proposed classifi-
cation, and the desire to pass from the strong into the
weaker gang ; but on the ordinary claims of indulgence,
or exemption from work, he speaks more copiously in his

* P. 184.

by which Slave Labour is enforced. 237

chapter on the sick, a few extracts from which may suf-
fice :

" Sorry am I that the subject requires me to say, that no
" part of negro management has been more neglected, or erro-
" neously performed, than that which regards the treatment
" of the sick. I have seen many slaves that were compelled
" to persevere at their work, who ought to have been in the
" hospital. This may have arisen sometimes from the im-
" patience of the master to advance his work ; but I believe
" much more generally, from the difficulty which he is under,
" of distinguishing real from affected illness ; for when labour
" presses, all would be ill to escape the field ; and it is not at
" all times in the power of the doctor to discover the impo-
" sition."*

He proceeds, in that and the following chapter, to give
such an account of the general neglect of the sick, and the
ordinary state of the hospitals and sick-houses, as would be
well wortli the perusal of those who have been taught to be-
lieve, that the humanity of masters, and their regard to their
own interest, are sufficient pledges for the good treatment of
the slaves ; but this part of the system well deserves a separate
consideration, and L will here extract only one passage or two
that are in point to my immediate subject ; as they shew to what
miseries the poor slaves will submit to escape from the driving-
whip.

'' It is in vain to dissemble," says he, " that the sick are
" but too frequently neglected ; for the hospital being rather
*' a disgusting scene, charged with unpleasant odours, and
" occupied by offensive objects, it is no wonder that men
" should neglect a duty the performance of which is attended
" with painful emotions." "The negroes are overlooked or for-
•* gotten, they linger in misery and pine in neglect, and if
" they recover, you may be assured it is nature that has car-
" ried them through the disorder. "f

Even with the improvements which he in this respect suo"-
gests, the hospital would be apparently a most deterring abode.
It is in fact a prison, which he says, should be " secured by

P. 236. t Ibid. p. 253-4.

238 Of the cruel and pernicious Means

" bars OK jealousies to prevent the escape of the negroes ;" and
to prevent the nurses' connivance at their going out by night,
he advises to have the key of the outer door brought in the
evening to the manager's house. He states also, that " it is
" usual on many estates, when the negroes are in the hospital,
"to give them no other food than what their friends sup-
"ply."

All this would seem to make the hospital, or sick-house, as
it is more usually called, no very desirable retreat. Yet, he
says, " If your humanity disposes you to be very indulgent to
*' your negroes, or if their labour be at all severe, &c., your
" sick-house will probably be crowded with complainants,
"some of whom will be really ill, while others only affect to
" be so, either from natural indolence of disposition, or from
" their having overslept themselves, being afraid of going to
" the field, lest they should be punished for the delay. It is
" your business to ascertain from which of these causes their
" presence in the hospital arises ; and this is a task of no or-
" dinary difficulty ; as every art will be used to mislead and
" deceive you."*

He proceeds to give suggestions as to the best means of
lessening this difficulty, and therein observes, " You will find
" others, who without any illness to which you can give a
" name, have notwithstanding a claim to your indulgence,
" for they have been harassed by the preceding day's work,
" and feel languid and exhausted. This happens frequently
" to very old negroes, whose constitutions are not very robust,
** and may happen to others, even of the strongest, after great
" exertions and hard continued work for too great length of
*' time. You may the more safely indulge them with the sick-
*' house, under the assurance, that they will remain there no
" longer than is really necessary for their recovery."

" Some negroes may be really indisposed, though they are
" without any of the symptoms which indicate indisposition,
" but as it is impossible for you to judge with certainty in
" suqh cases, and as the business of the plantation could be
" veiy ill-performed, if you were indiscriminately to indulge

Ibid. p. 259.

by which Slave Labour is enforced. 239

" all who prefer rest to labour, you must be governed by the
" general habits and reputation of the negro, &c. You may
" expect to be often deceived ; but if a man is to to err, it
" should be on the side of humanity."*

Those who have ever allowed themselves to be deceived by
the impostures of other colonists, surely cannot read passages
like this without astonishment. " How," they may reasona-
ably exclaim, ** do the planters attempt to reconcile such fea-
" tures of their system, with the accounts they give us of the
" lightness of slave labour, of the hilarity with which it is per-
" formed, and of the copious leisure and manifest comforts
" and recreations, nay the dissipation and luxury, which are
" enjoyed by the labouring slave ?" I answer they do not at-
tempt it at all. They are too prudent to notice the admis-
sions of men of their own party, whose credit they know it
is in vain to impeach, especially such men as Dr. Collins.
They have a less hopeless game to play ; like that of the counsel
for a defendant in a desperate case, who is too prudent to state
and answer the evidence he has to grapple with, but endea-
vours to draw off the attention of the jury from its effect by
lauding the general character and conduct of his client, and by
insidious imputations on the plaintiff. They rely on the inat-
tention or forgetfulness of the British public in a long and
wearisome controversy ; and hope, not I fear in vain, that
bold generalities of assertion, however irreconcilable with the
established facts, mixed up with incessant railings against their
opponents, as fanatics, enthusiasts, and incendiaries, will
supply the place of sound or consistent argument, and fair
investigation.

But those impartial minds who feel it a duty in this cause
of helpless and oppressed multitudes to reason before they de-
cide, will see enough even in the last extracts I have given, to
beat down all the sophistry, and all the falsehood of their op-
pressors ; for what must be the irksomeness of that labour,
what the severity of that discipline, to escape from which a
loathsome hospital, and close imprisonment, is so cov€ted an
asylum, that the slaves resort to falsehood, and artful imposture.

Ibid. p. 260, 261, 262.

240 Of the cruel and pernicious Means

at the peril of the cart-whip, to obtain it ! What must be
thought here of the audacious comparison with the state of
the free peasantry of England ! The wages of our agricultural
labourers are often lamentably low, and their comforts scanty
enough ; but when were they found desirous to exchange their
employment in the field, to obtain, under the pretence of sick-
ness, admission into our hospitals, or the parish workhouses?
the worst of which are most desirable abodes when com-
pared to a plantation sick-house.

What I would chiefly here draw the attention of my readers
to, however, is the admitted ordinary difficulty, and frequent
impossibility of distinguishing between real and pretended in-
capacity for labour ; and this not by the drivers only, but by
the proprietor or his manager, and even by the medical prac-
titioner, called the doctor of the estate. If it is hard or im-
possible for them to determine in the case of the slave who
asks as*' an indulgence," and a boon, an exchange of the field
for the hospital, on the score of debility or disease, whether
the plea is well or ill founded, surely it must be still more out
of the power of the drivers, to decide such a question during
the long protracted labours of the day, when individuals of
the gang under their discipline, work with langour, and
allege bodily indisposition as the cause, I do not indeed find
it any where alleged that the driver's authority extends to
the allowance of any such excuse, so as to dismiss them from
the field. I believe he has no such power ; and as to that of
sparing them in their share of the forced exertions,let the reader
recollect what I have beforecited from the same high authority,
" your drivers, insensible of the cause of their backwardness, or
" )iot iveighi)ig it properli/,ivill incessantly urge them ivith stripes
" or threats to keep up tcith the others, bj/ trhich mea)is thetj are
" overwrought ami compelled to resort to the sick-house ;" i. e. on
their return to the homestall.

Let not the drivers bear unjustly the whole reproach of this in-
sensibility, for how could they possibly distinguish, if permit-
ted to do so, between real inability and disinclination for the re-
quisite exertion, when it is admitted that that the latter is so
general, as always to furnish a probable motive for dissimulation;
and that the former is frequently so well feigned as to deceive
the most intelligent and expert ? In all probability it is often

hi) whkli S/ave Labour is enforced. 241

truly alleged in the field during work by the very individuals
who had been refused the asylum of the sick-house when
they craved it from the manager in the morning ; and is the
driver to receive an appeal from that judgment? He has a
certain force committed as effective to his direction : at his
own peril of servile punishment, the appointed work must be
accomplished by the gang ; and were he to spare any indivi-
dual who alleges incompetency to his proper share of it, the
common task could not be fully performed.

It is not then to be imputed to the drivers, nor always to
the overseer or manager, nor even to the doctor, if he is
consulted,* when a feeble or sick slave, is driven all day long
to the most arduous exertions under a tropical sun, kept to his
labours till raidnip;ht, and oblioed to resume them at the ear-
liest dawn, though all the while diseased and exhausted nature
is pleading earnestly for repose. The fault is inherent in the
unnatural and opprobrious system of coercion itself; and could
no other cause be assigned for the shocking waste of life upon
sugar estates, in a race uncommonly robust and prolific, this
might be enough amply to account for it.

I might further enlarge on this odious practice of driving,
I might shew by evidence equally beyond dispute, its perni-
cious effects on the weaker sex, especially in their times of
pregnancy. I might shew how incompatible it is with all the
proper incentives to virtuous industry, how infallibly it produces
an aversion to voluntary labour, destroys every germ of civiliz-
ation, precludes advances in moral and intellectual character.

* Doctor Collins, indeed, censures, and not without reason, the frequent
conduct of medical practitioners in such cases : " He (the doctor) pops
" into the hospital and questions the sick; when, if the pulse neither in-
" dicates fever, nor the frequency of evacuations a flux, he concludes there
" is no disorder, and the negro is dismissed to the field ; yet even by this
" attendance, superficial as it is, he earns dearly enough the slender
"stipend that is allowed him. (p. 254.) Dearly indeed! since he must
" either be the daily dupe of his unfortunate patients, to the ruin of his
" own credit and practice, or risk the subjecting them by his errors to un-
"just and cruel, and even to fatal effects. I have heard such men
" complain of this branch of their duty as an intolerable burthen on their
" feelings."

N OL, II. U

242 Of the cruel and pernicious Means, ^c.

hardens the heart of the master, and brutifies the slave. But

these topics may be pretty safely left to the reflections of

every considerate reader ; and I ought not, without necessity,

to extend the limits of a work, that is already, I fear, too

bulky for the time and patience of active and influential

minds.

243

CHAPTER VITI.

THE MAINTENANCE O I' THE PLANTATION SLAVES IS IN
A VERY OPPRESSIVE AND CRUEL DEGREE PARSIMO-
NIOUS AND INSUFFICIENT.

Section I. — This Proposition shewn to be highli/ probable
from the Nature of the Case.

Having demonstrated that the forced labour on sugar es-
tates is oppressively severe, in all the various views I have
taken of it, in its duration, its intensity, and the means of
its exaction, and that the consequences are highly cruel and
pernicious ; I have next, in pursuance of the plan proposed,
to state " the ordinary treatment of the slaves in respect of
" food, clothing, and other necessaries, under the general head
" of maintenance :" and first, as to the most important article,
food.

But here, as in the preceding branches of my subject, I
have, prepossessions to encounter, as well as bold and artful
and assiduous misrepresentations of the actual practice, to
refute ; I will, therefore, again request my readers to reflect
on the inherent probabilities of the case, before I state the
facts to them, and adduce the evidence.

It was shewn that the natural and inevitable tendency of
the master's avarice or selfishness, armed with irresistible
power, and even of his necessities, consequent on the eager
competition that has long prevailed between planters, both
British and foreign, in the supply of the European markets
with sugar, must be to cheapen the forced labour era-
ployed in its production, to a degree highly oppressive upon

R 2

244 The Slaves art

the helpless enslaved workmen by whom the commodity is
raised. From this consideration and others, it was inferred
a priori, that the exaction of forced labour was likely to
have been pushed to excess ; and I trust that the inference
has now been abundantly confirmed by such evidence of the
fact as no candid mind can resist.

Now, the same reasoning tends, and with equal force, to
raise a high probability that the slaves are too penuriously
maintained : for as the cost of their maintenance is a deduction
from the annual proceeds of the estate, the lessening of this
must be dictated by the same motives, or enforced by the
same economical necessity, as the aggravation of the labour.
Subsistence has not improperly been called " the wages of the
" slave;" and a reduction in the rate of wages is a saving
expedient at least as likely to be adopted by employers who
have power for the purpose, as an increase in the quantum
of work. Where the labourers are free, it is when competition
presses on the master for oeconomy, his first, because his most
easy, if not only resort : but even in the treatment of slaves,
it is easier to withhold than to exact ; and especially when
the quantum of forced labour already imposed is too great to
be easily sustained.

Nor will this argument lose any of its force, if we suppose
the slave to be chiefly or wholly maintained in respect of
food, by means of his own labour, in raising provisions for
himself; because the time and capacity for work allotted to
that purpose, might otherwise be employed for the master's
more direct and immediate profit, in the enlargement of his
crops. It will be a perfectly fair, as well as the simplest and
clearest, view of the subject, to regard the whole value of the
maintenance, however supplied, as a deduction from the
actual or potential proceeds of the estate.

When slaves are kept for the master's convenience, luxury,
or state, not his agricultural or manufacturing profit, there
is little or no temptation to subject them to any excess of
labour ; but only to stint them in their maintenance. This
was, for the most part, the case in that slavery which is
noticed in the apostolic writings ; and we consequently find
a precept opposed to the latter mode of oppression, " Masters
give unto your servants that which is just and equal," but no

very scatitUy nudntaincd. 245

specific prohibition of imposing on them an undue quantum of
work. With the sugar planter, on the contrary, whose profit
from the labour of his slaves is his sole object in acquiring
or keeping such property, the temptation to a selfish abuse of
power is not only in the withholding what is just and equal,
but in pushing the forced labour to excess.

In one view, indeed, the planter may be thought the most
likely to exceed on the withholding, or penurious side; es-
pecially when money is to be paid for the articles of main-
tenance that he has to provide ; for avarice is often seen to
prompt men to be sparing in their immediate pecuniary dis-
bursements, even at a great expence of their future gains.

The sugar planter's temptations on this side, are much
enhanced by the great number of slaves he has to maintain.
If, like English farmers, he had but three or four labourers
constantly in employ, the difference between a moderate and
severe economy in their subsistence, might be a saving little
worth his attention; but having perhaps two hundred ne-
groes, to be fed throughout the year, the saving a few pounds
of flour or grain in the weekly rations of each individual, or
the labour of half a day weekly in the time allowed for raising-
provisions, is felt by him as an important object. Let it be
supposed that four pounds of flour per week ought to be
added to the actual allowances, in order to make them, in
a humane or equitable view, sufficient; and that this quantity
of imported flour would cost a shilling. If so, the planter
saves by the present scantiness of his rations, ten pounds
every week, and no less than five hundred and twenty pounds
yjer annum.

Can it be thought, then, that the same men who, whether
from avaricious views, or by the constraint of their own ne-
cessities, have imposed on their slaves a cruel excess of la-
bour, forcing them to work on an average sixteen hours and
upwards, and often eighteen hours in the twenty-four, and
depriving them in great measure of their sabbath rest, have
resisted the stronger and nearer temptation of saving large
sums, or gaining much exportable produce, by a too parsi-
monious scale of subsistence, or too scanty an allowance of
time for raising it ?

No counterpoise to the temptation can be suggested in the

246 The Slaves are

one case, that does not exist in the other, to at least an equal
degree. As to feelings of humanity, these, while unspoiled
by habitual violence done to them in practice, might be ex-
pected to oppose rather more strongly any excess on the
exacting, than on the withholding side ; because the neces-
sary means of giving effect to the former, are more actively
and manifestly cruel, and more revolting to liberal minds.
The sufferings of the hungry or ill-fed slave may not present
themselves to the master's eyes or ears ; but to force from
him exertions beyond what his nature can sustain without
distress, the whip must be ruthlessly employed.

It is enough, however, for my present purpose to contend,
that where the one species of economical abuse prevails in
a cruel degree, the other is not likely to be absent ; and
having proved to what a truly enormous excess the forced
labour of slaves is carried on suoar estates, I am entitled to
infer tbe great probability that their maintenance is not li-
beral ; but in a high degree the reverse. " The same fountain
does not cast forth at the same time sweet waters and bitter :"
nor can we expect that the same masters who covetously and
cruelly overwork their helpless bondsmen, deal out to them
with a humane and liberal hand, the maintenance which is
the price of their service.

Having looked thus far at the inherent probabilities of the
case, let us next see what is the extent of past and present
controversy as to the actual facts of it.

Section II. — Extent of Co)tlroversy on lids Subject.

It was shewn in my former volume (p. 89 — 100), that in
a very comprehensive class of ordinary cases, the inadequacy
of subsistence was put out of dispute, by the express ad-
missions of the colonists, the statements of their assemblies,
and the recitals of their laws. When the planters are ne-
cessitous and embarrassed in their circumstances, their slaves,
it was admitted, are not only scantily fed, but often subjected
to absolute want. Now a large proportion of the sugar-

oery scantily maintained. 247

planters are at all times necessitous and embarrassed ; as
was abundantly shewn from the same authorities.*

It may seem therefore that there can be no question at issue
between the colonial and anti-slavery parties as to sufficient
or scanty feeding, that is not qualified with reference to the
master's circumstances, or his ability to provide an adequate
supply of food. But to assume this, would be to suppose the
colonial party concluded by their own admissions or state-
ments; and held to the vulgar rule of consistency in their
propositions and reasonings; whereas the apologists of slavery
seem to think that the difficulty of their undertaking entitles
them always to play fast and loose with their own premises,
and to contradict themselves and their employers as to matters
of fact, and of argumentative deduction also, as often as it
suits their purpose. Many of them, in this instance, notwith-
standing the express admissions I have referred to, have
stoutly maintained, and continue to assert, in the most univer-
sal and unqualified terms, that the slaves are abundantly fed ;
and have even derided, as absurd and incredible, every con-
trary statement by anti-slavery writers.

Should any reader, a stranger to this new style of contro-
versy, ask, " then how do they dispose of the testimony given
on their own side, when quoted against them ?" I answer (as
before, in regard to labour,) by leaving it wholly unnoticed.
Like able generals in the improved art of war, they dash
forward for the sake of immediate effect, with their full force of
intrepid assertion and abuse, regardless of the strong positions
before surrendered by themselves or their copartizans which
the enemy holds in their rear.

Sometimes they practice a still more dexterous and daring
manoeuvre, of which their professed reply to my first volume,
under the name of Mr. Alexander Barclay, furnishes many
examples. It is to treat a statement of their own party when
cited against them, not as a quotation, but as a mere ipsediiit
of the opponent who cites it ; and then give it a bold contra-
diction ; leaving the reader wholly unaware that it was
grounded on authority they were bound by, or on any
evidence at all. By this honest stratagem it is concealed

* \'ol. i. pp. 89 — 99, and Appendix tliereto, No.I\^

248 The Slaves are

from the readers of Mr. Barclay's work, that I had cited in
proof of the propositions last referred to, such high colonial
authorities as Sir William Young, Mr, Barham, Dr. Collins,
Mr. Bryan Edwards, the petitions of the Jamaica Assembly,
and the Act of the Legislature of all the Leeward Islands;
though I not only cited them all, but used their very lan-
guage, to shew the perennial prevalence of distress and ruin
among the planters of the sugar colonies ; and the sad effects
of the master's debts and necessities on the subsistence of
the slaves. My opponent has the superlative confidence to
treat the proposition, that the slaves suffer in those very ordi-
nary cases, as if it stood on my suggestion alone ; next to
oppose to it his own unsupported assertions : and then to rail
at me for havino; advanced so groundless a charge.*

Having to deal with such antagonists, it is not easy for me
to say what the limits of this controversy now are ; what
points may be taken as conceded, and what are still in dispute.
According to all the colonial authorities cited in my former
volume, and many more that I could add to them, I might
fairly assume as an admitted fact, that the slaves of indigent
and embarrassed planters are often " scanted in their main-
" tenance," i. e. left ill-clothed, under-fed, and half-starved ;
and it seemed that, in respect of such cases, I had only to
contend, as I did in my former volume, that the excuse de-
rived from the master's necessities is, in its principle, unsound.

This I maintained, and still maintain ; because it is unjust
and inhuman to hold men in slavery, to work them hard, and
take all the fruits of their labour, and yet leave them in want
of food, in order that the master's debts may be paid, or the
coercion of his mortgagees prevented ; because, also, it is ad-
mitted, and quite undeniable, that the slaves could provide
sufficiently for their own subsistence, if land enough and time
enough were allowed to them for the purpose ; and further,
because the colonial legislatures might (as that of the Leeward

* See my first volume of this work, pp. 89 — 100, and tlie Appendix,
No. TV. and Mr. Barclay's " Examination" of it, pp. 70 — 74. Let any
reader who doubts whether such fraudulent artifices as I have here ascribed
to ray opponents are really and systematically practised by them, fairly
compare the two works in the places here referred to.

very sccnitili/ maiiilained. 249

Islands did, though by a law obsolete in practice) make the
expense of their maintenance a primary charge on the produce
of their labours.

So I argued ; and the arguments are to this hour un-
answered. But now the colonists, by their new champion,
discard their own former premises ; and, instead of defending
the once acknowledged case, or noticing the proofs of it that
I cited against them, turn round on me, and stoutly deny that
it has, or ever had, any existence. Let me again place one or
two of the former admissions under the eyes of my readers, and
with them these strange retractations. " Whereas (said the
" preamble of the meliorating act of the Leeward Islands) many
'^persons have often been prevented from supplying their slaves
" with sufficient food andclothing, by the encumbered state of their
"property; those plantations and slaves being sometimes charged
" with mortgages or other incumbrances to so great an amount as
" to leave no surplus &jc. for the riecessary subsistence of their
" slaves ; and merchants have been discouraged from selling pro-
" visions or clothing to persons in doubtful or embarrassed circum-
" stances, to the very great distress and danger of the slaves, and
** also to the manifest prejudice of mortgagees or other creditors,
" whose securities may, in very great measure, depend upon the
" lives or good condition of such slaves.''*

Many years later, and seven years after the abolition of the
slave trade, the Council and Assembly of Antigua recognized
in substance the continuance of the same case ; stating as an
excuse for the non-execution of a law, prescribing certain al-
lowances of provisions for the plantation slaves (a default
which they were driven by parliamentary investigations to ad-
mit), that " many proprietors, though very desirous of com-
" plying with the provisions of the law, were prevented from
" so doing by the unavoidable difficulties under ivhich they la-
" boured,'' and " that there were many planters ivho had it not
" in their power to icithhold any part of the produce of their
^' plantations from their creditors." f

* See Vol. I. p. 92, and the Act itself, in papers, printed by order of the
House of Commons, June 8, 1804, H 24.

t See Vol. I. p. 100, and Papers of July 1'2, 1815, p. 14'.'.

'250 The Slaves are

And what said the assembly of Jamaica ; an island which
the authors of Barclay's Practical View delight to resort to
for their asserted facts, treating a defence of its system, even
in points confessedly peculiar to it, as a sufficient one for all
the sugar colonies ? " It is to save our oion labourers from
" absolute want that ive solicit the interposition of our Sovereign/'
&,c. " Thej/ will not be peisuaded that their masters are innocent
" of their miseries ; and their rage and despair may involve our
*' country in anarchy and blood.'" — " From the impossibility oj
" giving the usual comfoiis to their labourers, all are exposed to
" the eff^ects of convulsions," &c. *' It is enough for us to allude
" to them, without opening up their horrors." Again, " The pro-
" prietor sickens at the additioiud labour of his people, while he is
" unable to give them the usual remuneration of their toil."*

Such were some of the statements, such the painful con-
fessions, of these legislative bodies, which I cited and relied on;
and Dr. Collins was shewn to have confirmed them in a way
the most impressive : for he laboured to convince his unfortu-
nate brother planters, that it was their duty to surrender
their estates to their creditors, when unable to feed their slaves
sufficiently, rather than relieve themselves from their difficul-
ties, or take the chance of doing so, at the cost of" the blood of
" their oicn species."

I certainly was of the same opinion ; and thought moreover
that it was a reproach to the colonial legislatures to have left
open that " horrid" alternative, as Dr. Collins justly called it,
by not compelling the planters, in whatever circumstances, to
give a sufficient maintenance to their slaves, while working
hard for their profit.

But we were all, it seems, dreaming of phantoms that had
no real existence ! for the colonists now assure us, by the pen
of Mr. Alexander Barclay, that slaves do not suffer at all in
such circumstances, and from the nature of the case cannot pos-
" sibly do so ;" that the mortgagees are the real proprietors,
and would supply them if the master in possession could not ;
but that, in point of fact, planters, however " miserably dis-

* Ibid. p. 90, 90, 91, and the original public document there referred to,
being a petition from the Jamaica Assembly to the Prince Hegent inl811,&c.

vnfii sea II tilt/ mainlaiiied. 251

" tressed themselves," never do curtail the comforts of their
slaves."* " Quo teneam vnltus, mutantem Protea nodoV —
To argue with these opponents on their own ever-shifting pre-
mises, is like painting a canielion.

They are not content, however, I repeat, with the privilege
of self-contradiction, even in its most glaring forms ; but with
matchless assurance, arraign of falsehood and defamation any
antagonist who ventures to quote against them such former
statements of themselves, their co-partizans, or employers.
Shamelessly sinking the fact that such quotations were made,
or any other authority adduced against them, they ascribe to
his misrepresentation and malice the very statements and con-
fessions he cites. The style in the passages here referred to,
as in many other instances of these most disingenuous
evasions, is, "il/r. Stephe>isaijs," " Mr. Stephen himself acknoiv-
" ledges,'' &c. and hotv can the mortgages, as Mr. Stephen says,
" affect the slaves so seriously," 8cc. Nay, the practical
remedies which I had suggested for the often-acknowledged
mischief, though borrowed from the Act of the Leeward
Islands itself, and recommended by me on the authority of that
precedent, are characterised as " neiv attd dangerous schemes and
" innovations, founded on ignorance and false assumptions, and
" on fallacious theories, applied by enthusiasts in England to a
"foreign communitj/, of the state of ivhich they are entirely ig-
" norant."-\

If the indignation and disgust which colonial slavery, when
truly pourtrayed, must excite in every liberal mind, were
capable of augmentation, surely it would be found in these
contemptible shifts, and fraudulent artifices, to which its
apologists are driven. X

* Barclay's Practical View, &c. pp. 70 — 74. f Ibid. p. 72.

X Let it not be supposed that 1 have selected this as one of the strongest
specimens to be found in this work of Mr. Barclay, though put forth and
widely circulated by the colonial party, and boasted of by them as a satis-
flictory reply to my former volume. Let any man select at random from
his 491 pages any one in which my former volume is referred to, and then
collate the commentary with the text, and with its immediate context; and
I will undertake to shew to him either some manifest suppression or muti-
lation of my statements or arguments, some gross perversion of their mean-
ing, or at least some evasion or palpable sophistry in the reply affected to
be (jiven to nie.

252 The Slaves are

Leaving such replies to the understanding and feelings of
my readers, and resting on the very authoritative and decisive

By far the largest part of Mr. Barclay's Practical View, like the kindred
work of Mr. M'Queen, relates to topics which I have declined the discus-
sion of in this volume, for reasons already assigned ; and I have no desire
to exceed my proposed limits for the sake of replying more generally to
such antagonists, who have virtually put themselves out of the lists, by
violating every law of legitimate controversy. But among the noble and
honourable planters resident here, who have made themselves responsible
for Mr. B.'s work, by patronizing it, at least, and promoting its circulation,
there are some, perhaps, who are more than by profession friendly to the
})ioral and religious interests of their slaves ; and who may think conse-
quently that, when advocating these, at least, I ought not to have been
unfairly treated. I will therefore depart from my general rule, so far as to
ask whether they are prepared to approve and abide by such a disingenuous
and evasive defence of their moral characters, in the relation of slave-owners,
as is to be found in the following extracts.

In noticing a distinction between the West India slave laws, and our old
English law of villeinage, the former regarding the mother's servile state
as deciding that of the children, the latter the state only of the father, I liad
remarked that if the law of villeinage governed the case, the marriage of
slaves would have been anxiously promoted, instead of being discouraged ;
because without it no title to the issue could^ in right of the father, be made,
and being illegitimate they would, by the law of villeinage, be free ; whereas,
by the colonial law, the issue of an unmarried black woman, though by a
white man, are slaves, and belong to her master. I inferred, " that instead
" of sending out and employing as managers, overseers, and book-keepers,
" single men in the heat of youth, and giving them a range of intercourse
" among the female slaves, icnrcstranied by disfavour or reproach, and encou-
" raged by general example, married men, or men of strict morals or decent
" manners, at least, would have been preferred for suck situations." — Deline-
ation of Slavery, vol. i. p. 1 24.

Now what is Barclay's answer to this ? Suppressing entirely the context,
and leaving unnoticed the occasion of the stricture, he cites, with inverted
commas, the first clause of the above passage, omitting the words above
printed in italics ; and says, " The planters, complains Mr. Stephen, send
" out and employ as managers, overseers, and book-keepers, single men
" in the heat of youth," as if that had been the only charge against them ;
and then asks, " Can the planters find married men to go out to the West
" Indies with their families, or can the planters be reasonably required, from
" apprehension of immoral practices, to give all their servants the means of
" marrying and of supporting families ? Do the masters in England, where
" living is less expensive, act thus to their servants ?" And there he leaves
the defence of his honovirable employers.

Had the quotation been fairly made, his readers would have seen that not

rcri/ sc(titlilij iiutintaiiied. 253

colonial testimonies here cited and referred to, I will assume as
an established and well-admitted truth, that when the master
is necessitated and embarrassed, i.e. on a large proportion of
sugar estates, the slaves, though worked as hard or harder than
ever, are often very insufficiently fed ; or, to use the words of
that eminent planter and colonial champion the late Sir Wil-
liam Young, " the pressure of mortgages and personal need"
induce the planters " to scant and overwork their slaves -y* or
the reader may substitute, if he pleases, the more explanatory
concession of Mr. Bruithwaite, late agent of Barbadoes : —
" The allowance of corn to a negro must depend on the cir-
*' cumstances of his master. If the planter fails in his own
" crop of corn, he must purchase. Should the price demanded
" be more than he is able to pay, his negroes must suffer. To
" a planter in debt there may be a fatal difference to his negroes
" whether corn is at five, ten, or fifteen shillings per bushel ;
" as he may have credit for one hundred pounds, but not for
*' double or treble that sum."|^

Now what man not inured to the practical system can think
this a defensible part of it ? The labourer who is constrained
to work, and does work most arduously, for the benefit of a
particular master, is doomed to suffer hunger, and in a degree

the sending out young men, but the allowing them to exercise, without dis-
favour or reproach, their irresistible power of debauching the female
slaves, to which their youth and single state must strongly dispose them, was
the gist of the charge thus dexterously evaded ; a charge made by almost
every writer on one side of this controversy, and admitted by every writer
on the other who has ventured to touch on the subject; being, in fact, too
notorious for contradiction. But his readers then would have anticipated
the reply, that his comparison with English masters is preposterous and
insulting ; that as the managers are not domestic servants, no family incon-
venience, but the sordid economies alone of a sugar-plantation forbids their
marrying ; that no English landlord requires his steward or bailiff to live
unmarried ; and, above all, that such agents here, have no power of con-
straining, by the exercise of a despotic and tremendous power, the female
peasants on the estate to gratify their libidinous desires. There are never-
theless few masters among us, I trust, who would suffer the seduction of
their female servants by a bailiff or steward to pass uncensured or un-
punished.

* Vol. I. p. 95.

f Privy Council Report, part iii. title Barbadoes, 2 A, No. 5.

254 The Slaves are

that may be fatal to his frame, because that niastei- is in debt,
and because the whole marketable produce of the labour is
paid over to his creditors. The slave is starved, to save the
owner from a foreclosure or execution ! If this be right, or if
the legislators who permit it are guiltless, then the infamous
Mrs. Brownrigg, who was hanged in this country for starving
her apprentices, and another wretched female who recently
suffered here for the same crime, were perhaps condemned very
unjustly. Their excuse was probably not worse than that of
the embarrassed planters who starve their slaves ; unless neces-
sitous circumstances deserve less allow^ance in a low station
than in a high one.

This species of oppression is doubtless the most grievous,
generally speaking, on deeply encumbered estates ; but it is
not with a view to such cases alone, numerous though they
are, that I have adduced these well-established facts. They
evince clearly, what many on this side of the Atlantic may
find it hard to believe, notwithstanding the express testimony
on the colonial side which I have cited, and have still to cite.
They shew that, under some circumstances at least, British
planters are capable of subjecting their hard-worked labourers
to famine, and holding fast the chain of slavery, at the cost,
to repeat the strong, but just language of Dr. Collins, " of the
" blood of their oicn species.^' It will therefore be the less
difficult to believe, that under ordinary degrees of tempta-
tion, the same gentlemen have reduced the maintenance to a
degree at which justice and humanity revolt. That this is
the case, even under the most ordinary circumstances, I main-
tain, and undertake to prove.

Here the apologists of the system and their opponents have
been very widely at variance. Their general propositions, at
least, have been remote as the north and south poles from
each other. On the one side, the maintenance has been
alleged to be not only adequate, but liberal ; on the other, to
be in all points, comprising the vital one of provisions, op-
probriously scanty and sordid. The one party, as we have
seen, has excepted the case of indigent owners ; the other not
even the most affluent.

But wide though the controversy is, I trust to decide it to

very scant ih/ mainlained. 255

the satisfaction of every impartial judgment, by the testimony
of my opponents themselves.

My plan and means for doing so, will be, first, to overthrow
the false case set up on the part of the colonies, by a com-
parison of the general and very laudatory accounts of some of
their witnesses, with the less uncandid general accounts or
admissions of others ; and next, to shew and establish the
true case, by a collocation of the specific statements and de-
tails given by the same and other witnesses and writers on the
colonial side, as to the actual allowances of food and other
necessaries, periodically given to plantation slaves by their
masters.

Sufficient specimens of the general statements of my op-
ponents are already before my readers.* I need only ask
them to remember, that those laudatory testimonies applied
as strongly to the maintenance of the slaves, our present sub-
ject, as to the degree of their ordinary labour, in which I have
shewn them to have been extravagantly opposite to truth. I
will not encumber my work with further citations to the same
effect, though multitudes of them might easily be given ; for
what professed apology for slavery can we open, without find-
ing boasts that the unfortunate subjects of that state are
amply, and even superabundantly maintained? Many of those
writers are not content to stand on the defensive on this point;
but actually seem to rely on the alleged good feeding, and liberal
maintenance in all respects, of these poor beings, as an ade-
quate compensation for their harsh and perpetual bondage.

That, in respect of food, these pretences were in a great
degree unfounded, and opposite to truth, has already been
shewn. They were false, at least, in predicating of the slaves
at large, that which could be true only of such whose masters
either were not so poor and embarrassed as to be under a
strong temptation to scant them ; or had virtue enough to
resist that temptation, by surrendering their estates to cre-
ditors, that their slaves might be sufficiently fed. How far
the former description of planters is from being large enough
to characterize the general case, I have enabled my readers to
judge ; and as to the latter, I am not aware of any specimen

* See supm, p. 21 to 23.

266 The -S/aves are

of it that was ever known or alleged. But even if limited to
the practice of wealthy or prosperous planters, those state-
ments would confessedly require many and wide exceptions ;
for it is admitted, that from other causes than the master's
poverty and want of credit, viz, from his parsimony, or from
want of industry in the slaves themselves, (a pretext which I
shall hereafter consider and repel,) these poor labourers are
often scantily fed ; aye, and to a degree destructive of their
health and of their lives.

Dr. Adair, an experienced West India physician, and a
witness brought forward before the Privy Council Committee
by the agents of Antigua, assigned as one of the causes of
mortality and decline of population among plantation slaves
" the scantiness, and sometimes the bad qualitij of their food ;''
and added, for though " industrious slaves have generally so
" many other resources as (independent of their weekly
" allowance) to procure them not only the necessaries, but
" (to them) the luxuries of life, yet it too frequently happens,
'* that in the distribution of provisions a proper distinction is
" not made between them and the indolent and thrijtless, so
"that the latter by their improvidence are rendered tvorth/ess,
" and even noxious, bij habits of depredation,"

The Doctor added, " But in barren soils, and during long
" droughts, when the grounds allotted to each slave are not
" productive, even the industrious slave may suffer ; when a
" proper compensation is not made by an increase of the
" weekly allowance, and by giving them food nutritive and
" invigorating, in proportion to their labour. Though this
" distress may undoubtedly sometimes be otving to inattention,
" or ill-judged parsimonij, yet it more frequently proceeds fom
" real inability to apply an adequate remedy, from the scarcity,
" or bad quality of imported provision."^

Here we have a clear, well-attested fact, with a very ques-
tionable, as well as imperfect excuse. The most industrious
slave, i. e. he who adds to the enormous tale of daily work for
the master, every possible further exertion for his own support,
may, and often does suffer from hunger and inanition, and

* Privy Council Repoi't, title Antigua, No. 11.

mry scaiitilij maintained. 257

consequent diseases ; and this confessedly sometimes through
the cruel parsimony of the master.

That want is often the lot of" indolent or had negroes, idlers,
or vagrants," Sic. (terms which always, in the plantation
vocabulary, comprise those who are not hardy enough to
endure all the severities of their state,) was virtually admitted
by almost every witness, and by some of them in express
terms. " 7'Ae good negroes," said Mr. Douglas, ''live in
" plenii/ ; the vagrants are oj'ten in want, and it is impossible to
" prevent //."*

It is not, however, by these exceptions alone, important and
comprehensive though they are, that the statements I refer to
have been impeached. They have been already shewn to
have been since totally abandoned and retracted by the
colonists themselves ; for they related to a time long antece-
dent to the abolition of the slave trade, subsequent to which,
as we are now told, liberality, kindness, and attention to the
preservation of the slaves, had their commencement.

Whether the now alleged improvements are less fictitious in
respect of maintenance, than I have shewn them to be in the
article of labour, remains to be seen. In neither point would
there have been any need of, or any room for improve-
ments, if the account with which Parliament was deluded in
1790 had been true. But it is with the actual former case,
not the fabulous one, that we must compare the present, in
order to ascertain whether any improvements have been really
made; and it is important, in other views also, to shew in
every branch of my subject, to what an extent the mother
country was deceived by the colonists, as to the true nature of
a system which she is alleged to have concurred in, and to be
bound, at theexpenceof her purse and her conscience, to uphold.

I will not therefore be content with falsifying the general
proposition, that the slaves were liberally and abundantly fed :
I will shew in detail the shameful reverse ; but will first op-
pose to it colonial testimony of a general kind, in reference to
the time of that assertion, as well as to a later period.

No evidence to that purpose can be more impressive than
the statements and remarks of Dr. Collins, written several

* Commons' Report of 1790, p. -289.
VOL. II. S

258 The Slaves are

years after the latest date of the parliamentary evidence.
There is hardly a paragraph in his whole chapter on diet which
I might not here use with advantage ; and I regret that the
whole is much too long for insertion : but I desire the reader's
particular attention to the following extracts.

In reasoning anxiously to persuade his brother planters of
the West Indies at large, to be more liberal in their allow-
ances of food, he urges their own self-interest, in " the greater
" labour which a well-fed negro is capable of executing, in
" proportion to one who is half-starved, and in his exemption
** from disease, and its possible consequence, death ; for I
" avow it boldly," he adds, " melancholy experience having
" given me occasion to make the remark, that a great number of
" negroes have perished annually by diseases produced by inani-
" tion. To be convinced of this truth, let us trace the effect
" of that system which assigned for a negro's weekly allow-
" ance six or seven pints of flour or grain, with as many salt
" herrings, and it is in vain to conceal, what we all^ knoio to be
" true, that in many of the islands they did not give more.

" With so scanty a pittance, it is indeed possible for the soul
" and body to be held together for a considerable portion of
" time, provided a man's only business be to live, and his
" spirits be husbanded with a frugal hand ; but if motion
" short of labour, much more labour itself, and that too in-
" tense, be exacted from him, how is the body to support
" itself? What is there to thicken and enrich the fluids —
" what to strengthen the solids, to give energy to the heart,
" and to invigorate its pulsations ? Your negroes may crawl
" about with feeble, emaciated frames ; but they will never
" possess, under such a regimen, that vigour of mind and tone
" of muscles which the service of the plantation demands.
'* Their attempts to wield the hoe prove abortive ; they shrink
" from their toil ; and, being urged to perseverance by stripes,
"you are soon obliged to receive them into the hospital;
" whence, unless your plan be speedily corrected, they depart
" but to the grave.*

Is it an anti-slavery writer, an enemy to the colonies, (as my
opponents call every advocate for the poor slaves,) that writes

* Practical Rules, 87, 88.

verij scinitilij mai/itaiiied. 259

thus? or is it a man ignorant of the system, and prejudiced
against it? No ; it is a very eminent long-experienced West
India planter and physician, who had resided more than
twenty years in the West Indies, and who, even in this work,
was an apologist not only of slavery but the slave trade. He
it is, who avows the horrible truth that great numbers, every
year, of these wretched fellow-creatures, while working in-
tensely for the profit of their masters, are, by their sordid and
cruel parsimony, killed through inanition ; i.e. slowly starved
to death.

" It may possibly be urged in palliation of this practice,
" (adds Dr. Collins) that in cases of such short allowance
" as I have mentioned above, negroes do not depend upon
" that solely for their subsistence ; but that they derive con-
" siderable aid from little vacant spots on the estate, which
" they are allowed to cultivate on their own account. Though
" frequently otherwise, this may sometimes be the case ; yet
" even there, it is to be observed that such spots in the low-
" land plantations are capable of producing only for a part of
" the year ; either through the drought of the season or the
" sterility of the soil ; and when that happens, the negro is
*' again at his short allowance ; and, having no honest means
" of ekeing it out to make it square with the demands of
" nature, he is compelled to pilfer. His first depredations are
" directed to canes, which are nearest at hand, and abound
'' with a sweet and nutritious juice. For the purpose of con-
" cealment he penetrates into the cane piece, &c. He next ex-
** tends his ravages to substances more solid, and robs your
" poultry yard, &c. Is there any thing extraordinary in all
" this ? Far from it ; such conduct is perfectly natural, I was
"going to say justifiable: yet when the delinquent is de-
" tected and apprehended, he is severely whipped, and chain-
" ed, and confined. But neither chains, nor stripes, nor con-
" finement can extinguish hunger. The first moment of his
" release he returns to the same practices, and, dreading a
** similar punishment, on the apprehension of discovery, he
*' absconds into the canes, the woods, or among the negroes
" of some distant plantation, where he remains concealed,
" until being at length ferretted out by rewards and re-taken,
" he undergoes a repetition of the same discipline, which co-

s 2

260 The Slaves are

" operating with scanty nourishment, and with colds con-^
*' tracted by exposure to the weather during his desertion, it
" is ten to one but he falls into a distempered habit, which
** soon hurries him out of the world.

" Now this was set down as a vicious incorrigible subject,
" and his death is deemed a beneficial release to the estate :
" but if we consider the matter more closely, we shall see
" reason to suspect that the offences of this unfortunate slave
" did not arise so much from his natural bad disposition, as
" from the misery of his situation, and the misconduct of his
" master, who has in fact been his murderer, by withholding
" from him a subsistence equal to the demands of nature," &c.
" The truth is, being reduced to the alternative either of
" starving or stealing, he embraces the latter, only as the least
" evil of the two ; and thus provides for his stomach at the
" expence of his posteriors. Some negroes, however, either
" of more timorous complexions, who out of I'espect to their
" skins hold a cart-whip in abhorrence, or who, having a
*' greater faculty of fasting, resist better the impulses of ap-
" petite, struggle on with their short fare, until impoverished
" nature, manifesting itself in the shape of some visible dis-
" order, gives them a title to the sick-house, where they are
" indulged with all the facilities in the world to die."
(p. 90, 91.)

After such extracts, it may be thought that my undertaking
to shew from authenticated details, what the ordinary main-
tenance specifically was and is, so far as respects provisions,
might have been spared ; but as the subject is of vast im-
portance to the interests of humanity, and as a full explana-
tion of the practice will throw much light on the sordid
character of plantation economy in general, and expose the
gross impostures that have been used in its defence, I must
adhere to that part of my plan.

Section III. — Different modes of feeding the slaves in
different colonies.

Here 1 must remind my readers of a distinction formerly
made between two different classes of sugar colonies, which

very sca/iti/i/ maintained. 261

vary materially from each other in their ordinary modes of
slave subsistence.

Upon most estates in Jamaica, and many in those wind-
ward islands which are sometimes called the new or ceded
colonies, the slaves, for the most part, depend for their food
on the produce of provision-grounds, allotted to them indivi-
dually, and cultivated by each slave on his or her own ac-
count, on the Sunday, and at such other portions of daily or
weekly time as may be left at their own disposal after the
master's enormous demands for their labour in the cane
pieces, and at the sugar works, are satisfied. But in the Lee-
ward Islands, comprising Antigua, St. Christopher, Montser-
rat, Nevis, and Tortola,* the slaves are, generally speaking,
and on many estates exclusively, fed by provisions imported or
bought by the master, and served out to them in weekly
rations ; the cultivatable lands there being so fully occupied in
cane planting, and so subject besides to long droughts, (which
are destructive to native provisions, much more than to the
hardy and succulent sugar cane) that there are either no suffi-
cient allotments of land to spare for the slaves, or none that
can be depended on for their support. The former, for brevity
sake, I will call the home-fed, and the latter the foreign-fed
colonies.

Barbadoes is of a middle character ; the slaves being fed by
rations from the master's stores, but chiefly on provisions
grown on his account, and cultivated by the compulsory
labour of the gang at large ; and I understand the same to be
the general practice in Demerara and Berbice.

It is further, however, necessary to premise, for the clearer
apprehension of some of the evidence I have to adduce, that
even in the foreign-fed colonies, we hear of the negroes' pro-
vision grounds, often dignified by the name of gardens; be-
cause on many upland plantations, there are ridges of land
between the cane pieces and the wooded mountain-tops, too
sterile and steep for sugar culture, or for any other purpose

* Many estates, however, in Tortohi, have provision-grounds that are
allotted to the slaves for their support.

262 The Slaves are

than allotments to the slaves for what are called mountain
provision-grounds ; and which, from their great altitude and
the adjacency of the woods, are less subject to drought than
the lands below. On the lowland estates also, there are com-
monly "gi</ sides,'' i.e. the steep borders of wash courses,
and other broken bits of land unfit for cane-planting, which
the slaves of course are allowed to make such use of as a few
of them are able to do. There are also commonly a few
square yards of vacant ground dividing the negro huts,
which the occupiers may plant if they please ; but which
generally serve only for yards and passages between the hut^.
A calabash tree, from which the culinary and other vessels of
the slaves are supplied, or some other tree, is sometimes seen
there, and sometimes a few wild plantains or bananas,
which, when intermixed with the huts, give the group a
pretty appearance at a distance; but those arid little spots
furnish in no degree, or a most minute one at best, any arti-
cles of food.

All these petty portions of soil collectively, where there
are no mountain provision-grounds, are capable of con-
tributing in so very trivial a degree to the support of the
gang at large, and the attempts of the few individuals
who endeavour to raise articles of food from them, are so
often wholly frustrated by droughts, that in an estimate of
the general means of subsistence, they may fairly be thrown
out of the account. They have been so indeed by such laws of
the Leeward Islands, as regulate the allowances of food by the
masters ; and even by the more candid of the colonial wit-
nesses and writers. Nor are the mountain provision-grounds
in those colonies a resource of much importance; except on a
very few estates, where from local circumstances they are
more accessible, and more productive than common. In ge-
neral, they make such small returns of the inferior articles
of food they yield, and cost such of the slaves as are able
to cultivate them so much fatigue and detriment to their
health, from exposure to the chill air and drizzling rains of
the mountains, and from the temptation to eat their produce
before it is ripe, that I have heard it disputed as a doubtful
question between experienced planters in St. Christopher,

very scantily maintained. 263

whether the possession of them is, on the whole, any advan-
tage whatever to an estate.

For these general distinctions, like the rest, I subjoin some
authorities ; in pursuance of my ordinary plan to leave no-
thing that I state notorious, though its truth may be un-
proved.*

* " Jamaica and some of the ceded islands feed their negroes at less '
*' expence than the Leeward Islands, because they have great tracts of land
" which are wholly devoted to raising provisions for their negroes, which is
" not the case in the latter, where, in general, the subsistence of the negroei
" depends on articles of food imported." (Evidence of Mr. Spooner, agent
for Grenada and St. Christopher. Privy Council Report, A. No. 7.)

" The estates in the old windward islands, are not, in general, of above
" one half the extent they are in the ceded islands. They are of course
" worse appointed in provision-grounds; and as the climate of these islands
" is much more uncertain, vert/ little dependanct can he placed on their sea-
" S071S ; therefore it is not above one year in three that their provisions an-
^'' swerJ' (Evidence of James Baillie, Esq. Commons' Report of 1790,
p. 203.)

Privy Council Query, A. No. .5. "Are negro slaves fed at their master's
*' expence, or by their own labour ? and when fed by their masters, with
" what are they fed, and in what quantities ?"

Extract of the Answer of the Council and Assembly of Nevis. " Negroes
*' are fed at the expence of the master. The articles of their food are flour,
" pease, beans, oatmeal, Indian corn or Guinea corn, together with salt
" provisions." N.B. None of these articles are raised in the island.

Extract of the Answer of the Council and Assembly of Antigua. " Negro
" slaves are universally fed in this island, at their master's expence, with
" Indian corn, beans, rice, flour, yams and potatoes, they have likewise a
" number of salted herrings or salted fish, with a quantity of dried salt al-
" lowed them."

The answers from Montserrat were nearly to the same effect. All these
answers add, as will be presently shewn, the quantities of ordinary allow-
ance by the master, and also mention the small pieces of ground or gar-
dens allotted to the slaves, and their asserted power of adding to their
subsistence by means of them, and by other voluntary labours ; but it would
be premature to cite in this place more than is necessary to shew the gene-
ral dependance, in those islands, on imported food.

" In Grenada we gave no provisions to a healthy slave, (except herrings
^' or salt fish) without their own provision-grounds should fail them. Ne-
" groes are fed differently on different islands. In Grenada, where the
" estates are large and have a great deal of new ground, it has universally
" been the custom to allot so much land to each negro, for himself, his
" wife, and children, as was thought sufficient to maintain them." &c.

264 Of the Snhsislence

Section IV. — Of the mode and measure of subsistence in the
home-fed colonies.

It is obvious that where the subsistence of the slaves is
wholly or chiefly derived from the produce of provision
grounds allotted to them individually, and cultivated by what
may be called, though improperly, their voluntary labour,
the actual ordinary quantity of their daily or weekly food
cannot be clearly ascertained. It must depend on a variety
of different circumstances ; such as the extent and quality of
the land allotted to them, its position in respect of proximity
to, or remoteness from their huts, or the cane-pieces on which
they work, the period of the year, and the kind of weather

(Evidence of Alexander Campbell, Esq. Commons" Report of 1790-,
p. 141.)

But even in some of the Iiome-J'ed colonies, the planters, either from a
topical scarcity of provision grounds, or dislike to spare time enough for
their culture, often take the feeding of their slaves on themselves ; supplying
them either with imported grain and flour, or with native provisions raised
by other planters, or on their own estates upon the master's account.

" In Burhadoes (said Mr. Braithvvaite, agent for that island,) they have
" a constant allowance of food from their masters. Their food is Guinea
" or Indian corn raised in the country, and ground, at their master'sexpence ;
" and ground provisions such as plantains, yams, potatoes. Besides this
" they have maize, rice and salted provisions imported." (For the rest of
his answer, see supra, p. 244.)

" The custom with respect to the feeding of slaves (said the Governor of
" St. Vincent,) differs upon different estates. In general they are fed
" partly by their own labour, and partly by the assistance of their mas-
" ters," &c. (Evidence of Governor Seton of St. Vincent, Privy Council
Report, St. Vincent Q. A. No. 5.) " Upon some plantations they are fed
" almost entirely with ground provisions the produce of their own labour."
(Ibid. A. No. 7.)

" The slaves are fed at the expence of the owners in general, except in
" some cases where time is given to them in lieu of food, to work for them-
" selves in cultivating the grounds furnished to them by their owners ;
" which Creoles and other slaves, having been long in the country, usually
" prefer. (Same Report, Dominica, Q. A. No. .5. Evidence of Messrs.
Bruce, Gillon, and Eraser.)

in the Home-fed Colonies. 265

that has preceded, as being favourable to vegetation or the
reverse ; and above all on the quantum of time allowed by
the master, and what is called the industry of the slave, or
more truly speaking, his capacity in point of bodily strength
to work more or less on his provision ground, in addition to
his forced labour under the drivers.

To find a medium quantity among all these diversities, of
the food actually obtained in the home-fed colonies, is mani-
festly impossible. It would be so, even if the evidence I
have restricted myself to had been candid and impartial ;
for a planter himself could hardly furnish the necessary data,
even from his own particular estate. It is, therefore, chiefly
in respect of the J'u7-eig]i -Jed colonies, that I shall be able to
establish, by clear and direct testimony, the ordinary scale
of subsistence ; and to shew from them its great inadequacy
when the slave depends wholly or chiefly on rations served
out to him by the master. There, also, the food is often
of a kind the nutritive value of which we can in great
measure estimate upon data familiar to my readers ; whereas
some species of the indigenous provisions which constitute
the food of the slaves when raised by themselves, are known
to us only by name.

I must be content, then, to prove, in respect of the home-fed
colonies, from circumstantial evidence, and by inferences from
acknowledged facts, that the subsistence is, at least very often,
and in some comprehensive cases, greatly deficient ; and to
shew a high probability that its ordinary amount is much
less than justice and humanity require.

This has already in some measure appeared from quotations
I have given, especially from the authority of Dr. Collins in
his truly valuable work •* for his strictures were not confined
to the practices of the foreign-fed colonies ; and St. Vincent,
which was probably prominently in his view, because his
property and long residence had been there, was one where
home-feeding chiefly prevailed. The master's allowances or
rations, which he describes as so scanty, were partially and
occasionally in use in that island, as they were also in other

Supra, p. 258, 9, Sec.

26(j Of the Subsist ettce

home-fed colonies ; for many plantations in them, as we have
seen, have no provision-grounds ; and even in the most sea-
sonable places, those grounds sometimes fail from droughts,
hurricanes, and other causes.* If, therefore, I shall be able
to shew that when the planter in such cases feeds his slaves
wholly from allowances, his standard of sufRciency is not less
scanty and sordid than that of the foreign-fed colonies, it
will afford a fair inference that his allotments of provision-
grounds, and of time for their culture are not regulated by
more liberal feelings. It appears clearly, from Dr. C.'s advice
and strictures as to feeding in general, that he included in
his views colonies in which the home-feeding system was at
least partially in use ; and that in them the method of feeding
by weekly rations was often preferred by the choice of the
masters ; for he takes pains to persuade them that the former
is more beneficial to themselves ; " When the estate from its
" extent, or the quality of its soil or situation, will admit of
" it, certain portions of ground should be allotted to the
" negroes to plant with provisions, instead of giving them a
" weekly allowance ; and this is undoubtedly the best way
" of providing for their wants if thej/ are duly superintended
" in the culture of their grounds," &,c. (p. 100.)

He explains how intimate and particular that superintend-
ance ought to be ; and adds, that without it " the provision
"grounds will be found very much neglected, and the negroes
" as much at a loss for provisions as if they had no ground
" at all."

He holds it indispensably necessary in order to prevent
this, that one afternoon in each week, besides the Sunday,
should be set apart for the culture of the provision-grounds ;
and that the employment of it should not be trusted to the
slaves themselves ; but that immediately after the dinner hour

* See the authorities quoted above, p. 263. " Hurricanes occasion such
" a temporary scarcity of provisions as approaches nearly to a famine. In
" the islands which have been visited with this scourge, every production
" is swept from the face of vegetable nature, and that which the earth in
" part conceals from its researches, is yet so much injured as to be capa-
" ble of being preserved only for a very short time." (Collins, 114.)

in the Home-fed Colonies. 267

and grass-throwing, the Ust being called, they should be
accompanied to the grounds not only by the drivers, but the
overseer, who should walk round all the allotments, directing
his attention to each, and seeing every slave properly em-
ployed on his or her proper ground ; and afterwards, by a se-
cond visit to each allotment, ascertain that proper use has
been made of the time by each individual, and bestow
praise or rebuke accordingly. After all, he admonishes the
proprietor or chief manager, that he must not trust implicitly
to the information or reports of the overseer ; but must him-
self acquire a knowledge of the several allotments, and their
respective owners, and visit them from time to time to ascer-
tain the truth of the reports by the evidence of his own senses ;
for he adds, " that there is no part of the overseer's duty
" that he is more apt to neglect than this ; though nothing
" can be more essential to the health and welfare of the
" gang, who can no otherwise obtain an abundant supply of
" provisions than by a diligent culture of their grounds."
(p. 102, 3.)

Now, if we consider how very onerous these duties must
be on the overseers and managers, we might have well in-
ferred, without the express testimony of this experienced
planter, that they are in general left unperformed ; and the
self-fed slaves consequently often exposed to a distressing
scarcity of provisions.

Let it not, however, be supposed that all this laborious
superintendance, and a right application, in consequence, of
the weekly afternoon, would, in Dr. Collins's judgment, suf-
fice. He plainly enough admits that Sabbath work must
be superadded, though he felt it not right to recommend for
that day the like means of coercion ; for he adds, " 1 say
" nothing of Sunday : that being a day of rest or recreation,
" they have a right to dispose of it as they think proper ; but as
" they cannot be more innocently or beneficially employed than
" on their provision-grounds, every encouragement should be
" held out to them to apply their time in that way, by slight
" rewards or honorary distinctions, which, if conferred upon such
' ' as comply with your wishes, may induce others to follow their
" example." (p. 104, 5.)

Such precepts from an apologist of slavery, may surprise

268 Of the Subsistence

those who have listened to the recent tales of the planters ;
but the day of religious hypocrisy was not then arrived ; the
policy of seducing from the cause of the poor negroes their na-
tural allies, by persuading the pious part of the public that the
interests of Christianity might be reconciled with avaricious
despotism and a brutalizing bondage, had not yet been adopt-
ed ; and the systematic desecration of the Sabbath, even by
compulsory means, was therefore freely avowed.*

Doctor Collins was so far from representing that an af-
ternoon weekly, however well employed, would suffice with-
out Sabbath work in addition, to keep the slaves from want,
that he recommended the giving the half day in the middle
of the week, instead of the Saturday (on which day it is al-
ways given when at all) for the provision-grounds ; in order
that the slaves might have tivo weeklt/ periods at a convenient
distance from each other for bringing home the produce on their
return.f

Religion is one of the topics that I have left to other pens :
but Sabbath-breaking has an inseparable connection with this
subject of subsistence from the provision-grounds ; for if Sun-
day now, as my opponents have the face to assert, is "strictlij a
day of rest "X how can those grounds be cultivated, and their
produce brought home, so as to yield an adequate support 1

* " Besides this, (i. e. besides compelling the slaves to work on their
" grounds on the Saturday afternoon) it was the universal custom on a Sun-
" day morning at about nine o'clock, for the manager or overseer to go
" over the grounds, call out the lists, and see who were in their grounds ;
" as it was generally the orders of the owner or manager for the negroes
" to go to their grounds." (Evidence of that very eminent planter and
zealous defender of the system, the late Mr. Campbell of Grenada, Com-
mons' Report of 1790, p. 142.) The same witness being asked, (p. 179,)
"Are they compelled to labour at their own grounds?" answered, "Yes."

f "One afternoon of every week, exclusive of Sunday, must be allowed
" for the cultivation of their grounds. I should prefer Wednesday or
" Thursday to any other for that purpose ; because, being in the middle of
" the week, it enables your negroes when returning from their labour to
" bring home as many provisions as will serve them until Sunday, and on
" Sunday they may stock themselves until the middle of the week, which,
" where the grounds are remote from the negro houses, is no small advan-
'• tage." (Collins, p. 104.)

X Barclay's Introduction, p. 23.

i/i the Jlome-J'ed Colonies. 269

If, when Dr. Collins wrote, and Mr. Campbell and others
testified, a day and a half \oeekU) were necessary for their cul-
tivation, how has half a day weekly, or one day in every
fortnight, which the last and now subsisting Jamaica act
prescribes,* become sufficient for the purpose ? Unless the
grounds, like the clouds when dropping manna on the Is-
raelites, yield more plentifully in favor of the Sabbath, its
newly acquired rest, must, if real, have reduced sufficiency
to one third of enough.

That there has been such a reduction, I am indeed far
from beheving ; but it is only because I believe, or rather
certainly know, that these new pretences are wholly false.
The poor field-negroes work as hard on that day as ever;
because, as some of their religious instructors have truly
stated the case, " ihey must either profane the Sabbath or
starve."

It is clear, at least upon the authorities here cited, that
the Sabbath rest must be surrendered, and incessant labour
consequently submitted to, or the subsistence, where the
slaves are self-fed, must fall short. Now that the latter
alternative will be often hazarded, and actually incurred, by
the weaker slaves at least, of both sexes, after such severe
continuous labour for six days as I have shewn to be exacted
from them, will hardly be doubted. Even the laborious walk
to and from the provision-grounds must, in many cases, suf-
fice to deter the poor slave from going to them, and make
him or her truant to the Sunday task. In Jamaica they are
very commonly distant several miles from the homestall, and
on hills of steep ascent. Mr. de la Beche notices that his
own were on a mountain at a distance often miles. f

Prudent therefore, (however harsh and profane) is that prac-
tice which Mr. Campbell stated to be universal in Grenada ; the

* Act of December 1816, sect. 4.

f Notes, &c. p. 9. See also Beckford's Account of Jamaica, vol. ii.
p. 152, " If their grounds beat a considerable distance from the planta-
" tion, as they often are, to the amount of five or seven miles or more, the
'' journey backwards and forwards, makes this rather a day of labour and
" fatigue, than of enjoyment and rest."

270 Of the Subsistence

sending them onSundaysto their work on the provision-grounds
under the overseers and drivers ; but that it was not very
common elsewhere was asserted by other witnesses ;* and we
may indeed infer from Dr. CoUins's advice that it was at
least not universal when he wrote. It is probably less so
now, from the effect of that new policy to which I have ad-
verted .

That to many, at least, of the slaves in the home-fed
colonies, the provision-grounds at all times yield at best
but a precarious and insufficient support, is clearly dedu-
cible from that valuable body of evidence to which I have
so often referred, the examinations before the House of
Commons and the Privy Council, the only pubhc evidence
we have that enters into any particular account of the
system ; for when the planters spoke of the abundance
of food derived from the provision-grounds, they commonly
qualified it by the exceptions not only of drought and hurri-
canes, but also of slaves that were " bad, worthless, idle, or ill-
" disposed," terms the import of " which Dr. Collins has well
taught us how to understand. It is the "industrious" slaves
only we are told that never suffer want, except when the mas-
ter's necessities, or droughts, or hurricanes are the causes.i"

The plain English is, that those only whose moral and phy-
sical constitutions are patient and hardy enough to endure
incessant labour, may, where the provision-grounds are abun-
dant and seasonable, have a sufficiency of food.

The Dutch formerly had a method of treating vagrants
and other offenders against the police more ingenious than is
our tread-mill discipline. The man was put into a bath, in
which the water reached his chin, and a stream was con-

* See Mr. Tobin's evidence Com. Report of 1790, p. 277.

f " Coercion," said Mr. Tobin (where last cited) " is unnecessary to in-
" duce an industrious well-disposed negro to turn such grounds to the best
" advantage."

See also Mr. Douglas, as before quoted. The good negroes live in plenty ;
the vagrants "are often in want; and it is impossible to prevent it."

" The situation of slaves wlui are industrious, (said Sir Ashton Byam) is
"comfortable and happy." (Ibid. 115.) And he excepts (p. 105) as to
the sufficiency of the provision-grounds, " worthless and idle negroes, which
" are probably to be found in all gangs oj" slaves."

in the Home-Jed Colonies. 271

stantly adding to it. He had a pump handle put into his
grasp, by the incessant working of which he could pump out
as much water as flowed in ; but not much more. He had
to choose therefore, between hard work and drowning. The
situation of the self-feeding slave, when not driven to his
provision-grounds on the Sabbath, is much the same ; except
that want, not drowning, is the consequence of his inaction ;
and that, as it is a consequence not so immediate, foresight as
well as industry is necessary for his preservation.

If it be asked whether, upon these views, I regard the sub-
sistence in the home-fed colonies, as on the whole more in-
adequate than in those of the other description, 1 answer,
No. On the contrary, I believe, that in the former, generally
speaking, the slaves are less scantily fed ; and that the abler
part of them often have a sufficiency of vegetable food in
point of quantity, though in quality, for the most part, ill adapt-
ed to the support of hardworking men ; whereas the quan-
tity also is grossly inadequate where the slaves depend wholly
on the masters' allowances ; as I shall decisively prove when
I proceed to delineate the practice in the foreign-fed islands.

In Jamaica, I believe, the case to be for the most part, much
better than in any of our other sugar colonies. It is not
because the planters are more liberal ; for in clothing and
other necessaries, their slaves are not a whit better provided,
as I shall show, than those of other islands; nor is their
slavery, in other respects, more lenient either in practice or in
law ; but there is, in most districts of that island, a much greater
quantity than elsewhere of seasonable land fit for the growth
of provisions, and unemployed in the culture of canes; so that
few of the planters there comparatively, are under any great
temptation to stint their slaves improperly in the quantity of
their allotments, or to assign them in a barren soil ; though
they often lie at an oppressive distance from the home stall.
The best provision-grounds, however, will not suffice to pre-
vent want, unless time and strength enough are allowed for
their cultivation. And though it is obvious that where the
means of culture are the same, the better the lands, the
larger, ccBteris paribus, is likely to be the supjjly, I see not
how the weaklier slaves in Jamaica, or in colonial language,
the less industrious, can be exempted from often suffering

272 Of the Subsistence

under a scarcity of food ; though in a less degree, perhaps,
than those in other colonies. That they suffer generally and
severely, when their masters are in embarrassed circumstances,
we have seen to be fully admitted by the Jamaica assembly
itself; and the cause presumedly is, that planters, when forced
to push their cane culture to the uttermost, for the relief of
their own necessities, allow a less proportion of time to their
slaves for raising their own provisions.

One writer, the Rev. Mr. Bickell, who is well worthy of
confidence on these subjects, has distinguished the case of
this island so widely from the rest, as to admit that, though
the quantity of the food is very bad, much, generalhf speaking
cannot be objected to the quantiti/ of it. The concession, of course,
has been eagerly cited by the colonists ; and with their usual
unfairness. Suppressing the words " gencralli/ speaking," and
the context, that " the ti)ne alloived them for raising their pro-
" visions is not by any means sufficient,'' which shows that
the general case, especially with the more weakly slaves, was,
in the writer's contemplation, subject to very numerous ex-
ceptions; they triumphantly exclaim, " attd so the negroes
" have a sufficient quantity of food'' They add, "-and savoury
"food," because the same writer had elsewhere spoken, of their
pots of boiled vegetables seasoned with a small portion of salt
fish, as being savoury, though hehad at the same time described
the ordinary food of the slaves to be such " as an English
-pauper " would reject, and, think hardly ft for human and rational
" beings." Having thus fairly dealt with his authority, they
say, " this we should hope will be glad news to Mr. Ste-
phen.*

I must admit that there is one fortunate peculiarity in
Jamaica, if we may take the acton such authority as Bar-
clay's, which may make the case of the more feeble slaves
not so distressful there, as in other home-fed colonies ; for it
is stated that " calaloo or wild spinage grows as a weed in
" the cane-fields ; and that a certain yam grows wild in the
" fields that have been thrown out of cultivation and it is

* See and compare Barclay's Practical View, p. 439, witli ihe Rev.
Mr. Bickell's West Indies as they are, p. 10, 11. 56, 57.

in the Home-Jed Colonies. 273

" added that from November till April these are the princi-
" pal dependence of such indolent improvident creatures as
" will do nothing for themselves." I must dissent indeed,
from the encomiums contained in the same work on yams as
pleasant food, or fit to be compared with the potatoes of Irish
labourers, for the sustentation of hard working men ; espe-
cially in reference to the wild yams here spoken of, which Mr.
Bickell's condemnation of by the name of " negro yamsT
most strictly applies to. It is, I am well informed, to use his
expression, " hoggish food," having a harsh stringy texture,
far exceeding that of the worst cultivated yams, with much
less of their nutritious substance. I nevertheless, confess
that these, or even wild spinage, may allay the fierce cravings
of hunger ; and consequently that the lot of the indolent and
improvident, in plain English, the feeble and over-worked
slaves, may not be quite so bad in Jamaica, as in places where
such resources, or the uncultivated cane pieces which pro-
duce them, are not to be found. But we have here an incau-
tious avowal that even in Jamaica those slaves whose provi-
sion grounds from what is called indolence or improvidence,
do not yield them the means of subsistence, find no resource
in allowances from their provident masters ; but are left to
depend for their food on such supplies as the casual bounty
of nature may afford ; and that for five or six months in the
year. This is certainly '^ no news," s.i\\\ less '' good news, to
Mr. Stephen."

Whatever advantages the slaves in Jamaica, or in other
home-fed colonies, may have in comparison with those which
depend on imported provisions, there is one admitted counter-
poise, in the occasional famines to which long droughts and
hurricanes expose them.

Six successive hurricanes in Jamaica within eight years,
had according to the statement of its agent and planters
before the committee of Privy Council, been destructive by
partial famine and disease, oi " many thousands of negro slaves."*
Mr. Hibbert estimated the loss at 1 5,000,f and many other

* Privy Council Report, title Jamaica, Q. A. No. 30.
f Commons Report of 1790, p. 396.
VOL. 11. T

274 Of the Subsistence

witnesses ascribed to the same species of calamity the de-
cline or non-increase of the black population, chiefly through
the consequent devastation of the provision grounds.

" It is hardly possible (said Mr. Gr-egg) for the planter to
" provide against the dreadful effects of famine ; and I should
" not be surprised in case of a hurricane happening in the
" ensuing season, to hear of some dreadful catastrophe simi-
" lar to that which lately happened in Jamaica and Antigua,
" by which twentij-three thousand slaves perished."*

These probably were much exaggerated statements; for their
objects were to shew the necessity of the slave trade, and of
opening a direct commercial intercourse with the North Ame-
rican States. But Dr. Collins also, as we have seen, (supra
p. 266.) notices the calamitous effects of hurricanes in general
as an occasional cause of " scarcity, and approaching nearly
" to a famine, producing consequences fatal to the slaves."
He differed, however, so far from Mr. Gregg, as to hold the
guarding against them by the planter to be not only possible
but easy.^l-

That similar effects are produced by long droughts, has
before been noticed and proved. On the whole, it may be
affirmed, that though in the home-fed colonies, the slaves'
subsistence is commonly the least scanty, it is at the same
time the most subject to occasional and particular failure ;
and that feeding by rations from the master's stores, being
the more certain and equable, is the best for those who re-
quire most support, the feebler part of the gang.

That indigenous food should be raised when possible,
I admit, and on humane as well as economical views ; for
such sustenance is likely to be less sparingly given in

* Ibid. 234.

f " A prudent man ought never to be without a resource adapted to
" the emergency, which should be provided at the approach of the hur-
" ricane season. Nothing is better for that purpose than the Indian corn
" of America ; because if wanted it will afford a good food for the ne-
" groes ; and if not wanted for them it may be given instead of oats to
" the horses and mules, of which a great quantity would otherwise be
" consumed ; so that no loss whatever can possibly ensue from the salutary
" precaution." (p. 114.)

in the Home-fed Colonies. 275

ordinary eases, than that which the master has to buy ; but
there can be no good reason for leaving the supply of it to
the care of the slave himself; and it is a flagrant incon-
sistency in those who tax the negroes with indolence and
improvidence, to commit to their own prudence and volun-
tary exertions, the vital interest of their subsistence.

If lam asked, "what then should be done?" I answer,
Native provisions for their support should be raised by the
common labour of the gang on the master's account, as is
the practice in Barbadoes ; and meted out in adequate
weekly rations from his stores ; though land might at the
same time be allotted to those whose voluntary industry
might be employed upon it, to the improvement of their
own condition. Such, I doubt not, would be the genaral
system in the home-fed colonies, if it had not been found
inconvenient, or thought indecorous, to drive the slaves on
the Sabbath ; and a better mode, therefore, of exacting seven
days of labour weekly, to obtain the first, through their urgent
sense of their own necessities, by leaving to each individual
the task of raising his own food on that day.

We are frequently told that half a day's labour in a week,
or the amount of a week's labour in a year, will suffice to
furnish the slaves with an abundance of food. 1 quoted my
West India opponents to that effect in my former volume,
when arguing with them upon their own premises, in aggra-
vation of the injustice and cruelty of leaving their slaves to
suffer hunger and famine, when their owners were needy and
embarrassed, merely because land and time were avariciously
withheld from them. Those propositions are now cited against
me, in various places, by Mr. Barclay, as if they had been
originally mine, and advanced on my own authority. It is
true that I gave them more credit and countenance than they
deserved ; but expressly because I found what seemed to me
a satisfactory confirmation of those estimates of my opponents
in a State Paper published by President Boyer at Hayti, in
which half an hour's daily labour was said to suffice there for
a week's subsistence. I now believe that I had mistaken
the President's meaning. He was comparing, not the specific
produce of agricultural industry with the time employed in

T 2

276 Of the Subsistence

raising it ; but the high price of human labour in that coun-
try, with the general cheapness of food there.* If I had
been controverting an opponent's premises, such a mistake
would have been less venial ; but I had a right to argue ex
concessis, without very carefully if at all considering whether
the adopted proposition was correct.

The quantity of labour requisite to produce a given quan-
tity of food must obviously be widely different in Hayti,
where the cane lands, proverbially once the most productive
of any in the West Indies, are now applicable to that pur-
pose, from what it is in the old British colonies, where the
cane plant ingrosses all the soil rich enough to produce sugar
to advantage. I was, therefore, wrong, even on my own
former view of the authority, in supposing that the Haytian
estimate tended to support that which I borrowed from my
opponents, which I now believe to have been as deceptious as
their statements usually are.

Indeed, they practically show their own sense of its ex-
treme inadequacy ; for if half a day weekly will suffice, and
if they give that time, as they generally pretend they do on
Saturday, then what becomes of all the excuses for suffering
and recommending, not to say enforcing, the working in the
provision grounds on the Sabbath ? and how comes it that
advocates for humane improvements, like Dr. Collins, recom-
mend the systematic encouragement of that practice as es-
sential to the well-being of the unfortunate drudges them-
selves ? It is also, let us remember, admitted that the daily
respite of two hours at noon is often applied by the poor
wearied drudges to what on the estimate in question, would
be a needless purpose.

* The words, as quoted in my former volume, p. 90., were " L'tiomme qui
" travnille une demi heure par jour, ohtient nn suhsistance, pendant vne
semaine." I cannot now find the paper referred to ; but think the words
" pendant une semaine," would have been improper and unintelligible, if
the specific produce of the labour, as I supposed, had been in view.
Indeed, in that island where much of the vegetable food in use is of
spontaneous and perennial growth, the ratio between the labour and the
specific produce, could hardly be any subject of estimate.

in the Foreign-fed Colonies. 277

The fact is, that my opponents grossly exaggerated, in
the estimates referred to, the productive power of labour,
even when employed on the best soil ever allotted to the
slaves, and when aided by seasonable weather. At the same
time they forgot their own exceptions of droughts, hurri-
canes, and periods of the year in which the provision grounds
are very scantily if at all productive.

But it is high time I should proceed to the next division
of my subject ; and shew more clearly what is the actual
quantum of food, and what the colonial standard of suffici-
ency, by ascertaining its amount, when dealt out by the
master himself in articles that he has imported or bought.

Section 5. — Of the subsistence in foreign-fed colonies, in
respect of its ordinary nature and amount.

Here it will much assist the reader in rightly comprehend-
ing and weiohino; the evidence which I have to adduce, to
shew him, first, upon what specific points the parties to the
abolition controversy were originally at issue on this subject;
and how far they agreed in their statements.

For this purpose 1 cannot do better than to cite, on the
one hand, Mr. Ramsafs Essay ; and on the other hand Mr.
Tobin's " Cursory Remarks" on that work ; for these, as
before observed, may be considered as the original pleadings,
or allegations of the contending parties, when they first ap-
peared at the public bar in this country as accusers and
defenders of colonial slavery, on the question of abolishing
the slave trade.

In the present division of my subject, their statements are
of the more importance, because both Mr. Ramsay and Mr.
Tobin had long resided in the foreign-fed colonies of St.
Christopher and Nevis, to which, in consequence, their ac-
counts had a special reference ; and both went into details as
to the ordinary allowances of food in those islands ; more
especially in the former, where the pre-eminent and then un-
diminished fertility of the cane-lands had made the feeding
with imported grain far more exclusive, and dependence on

278 Of the Subsistence

the master's rations more absolute, than in any other part of
the West Indies.

If it were true, as my opponents commonly maintain, that
whatever enhances the present profits of the planter, promotes
also the comfort and welfare of his slaves, the subsistence given
at that period in St. Christopher, would form far too favourable
a specimen of the general case ; for the pre-eminent value of
the sugar of that island is notorious ; and so fertile then was
its soil, that some estates were known to produce from three
to four hogsheads, of a ton weight, for every acre they
planted ; nay, one or two plantations, near the town of
Basseterre, were generally said to have yielded, in a good
season, five such hogsheads per acre. But as I am far from
admitting, either that the slave is in general benefited by the
master's wealth, or that his wealth can be with certainty in-
ferred from the productiveness of his crops, I desire only that
the selection of St. Christopher, the colony with which I am
best acquainted, may not be thought unfair towards the
foreign-fed colonies at large.

I could wish to extract all that Mr. Ramsay said on the
subject of feeding; for it is highly impressive; but it will
suffice for the only use 1 desire to make of his work, to
quote merely the details he gave as to the ordinary weekly
allowances from the master. He stated, " that they varied on
" different plantations, from one to .three pounds of grain,
** under the Jiominal measure of from two to eight pints ;
** that a few plantations went near to five pounds, and one or
" two as far as six ; and that the slaves always received from
" three to eight herrings a week,"* But he alleged instances
of parsimony much below this general scale of subsistence,
cruelly inadequate though it must be seen to be.

Mr. Tobin, in his reply, said, " I shall not differ greatly
" from Mr. Ramsay, when I assure my readers that the general
'' allowance, on a tolerably well regulated plantation, is as
" follows, viz. out of crop time from six to nine pints of flour,
" oatmeal, rice, pease, &c., and from six to eight salted Scotch
" herrings, for a week, to each slave above the age of a suck-

Ramsay's Essays, p. 70. 80.

/// the Foreign-fed Colonics. 279

" ling infant. During grinding season, whicli lasts from four
" to live months, this allowance is perhaps reduced to from
" four to six pints of flour, &c., and to from four to six her-
" rings." He added, " exclusive of this regular allowance,
" it is customary, on most plantations, to give each negro at
" breakfast time, during the rainy time of the year, a ship
" biscuit, with a draught of molasses and water, which is dis-
" tributed in the field. This breakfast allowance is in general
" extended to the negro children through the whole year. I
*' will, however, drop for the present," he added, " all extra
" indulgences, and suppose the average allotvonce of' each slave
" through the tv/iole year, to he, weekly, six pints of Jiour, ^c,
" and six herrings."*

This, Mr. Tobin proceeded to maintain, proved the slaves to
be as well fed as our British labourers ; a proposition at which
my readers will doubtless be much surprised ; and which shall
hereafter receive the attention it well deserves. Meantime
an explanatory remark or two may be wanted on Mr. T.'s
premises ; which, though he regarded them as nearly con-
curring with those of his opponent, seem to differ from them
not a little. Jfpitits were to be taken as equivalent to pounds,
it is manifest that the medium of Mr. Tobin was the maximum
of Mr. Ramsay; whose larger allowances, besides, were ascribed
to only one or two plantations ; whereas Mr. Tobin spoke of
all " tolerably well reg^ulated" ones. The latter, however,
guarded himself by a note, as follows : — " In speaking of re-
" gulation, allowances, &c. I wish them to be understood as
" adopted by such estates as have f allot under my oivn imme-
" diate inspection. In a few, perhaps, the treatment of the
" slaves may not have been so liberal ; and in others, I have
" not the vanity to doubt but they may have been much
*' more so."

This disclaimer of vanity seems to shew that by inspection
we must understand direction, either as owner or attorney ;
and the doubtful terms as to other estates, plainly import that
the author disavowed any certain knowledge of their allow-
ances. If, then, we suppose, that in speaking of " tolerably

Cursory Remarks, p. 58-9.

280 Of the Sulmalcuce

well regulated plantations," he had in his view the standard
of feeding on those of which he was the owner or attorney,
the apparent difficulty of understanding him is lessened, or
removed. Mr. Ramsay's maximum may have been the true
medium of allowances on those estates; and the difference may
have been chiefly in their different views as to the compara-
tive numbers of those " well regulated plantations," and
others of an opposite character. The alleged approximation
and great apparent difference of the two accounts may, how-
ever, partly have arisen from the various terms of quantity
employed ; for though Mr. Ramsay had given the amount of
the allowances both by weight and measure, his opponent,
saying nothing as to weight, resorted to the pint measure
only. The former also had spoken of the pints as nominal
ones, with a meaning well known at the time *, and clearly
had in view such as were greatly below the standard pint of
this country, and had no uniform dimensions. This appears
from his general, though indefinite proportions, between the
numbers of pints and pounds ; for though he stated both as
varying on different estates, we find those proportions in
general given by him as nearly two pints to one pound ;
whereas a pint of flour weighs only about fourteen ounces.
Mr. Tobin neither repelled nor noticed the imputation of
false measurement ; and yet, strangely enough, chose to give
his quantities by the impeached pint measure alone, avoiding
the criterion of weight altogether. Nevertheless, he soon
after tacitly assumed, in his comparison of these allowances
with the subsistence of English labourers, that the pint of
flour, or even of unground Indian corn or beans, is equal to a
pound of the former ; though if so, the plantation pint must,
instead of falling short of the English standard, exceed it by
one seventh part at the least. It would follow also, on that
assumption, that the difierence between the two accounts, in-
stead of being small, was nearly as two to one.

* It was one among the charges against the planters on this head, that to
conceal in some degree the extreme scantiness of the allowances, many of
them reduced the wooden measure of this denomination to mucli less than
an actual pint.

in the Foreign-fed Colonies. 28 1

But as it is not incumbent on nie to vindicate the consis-
tency of a writer whom I quote only as an opponent, let it be
supposed that his statement was, in effect, widely different
from Mr. Ramsay's; and let it be further supposed, if my
readers please, that Mr. Ramsay's fell much below, and that
Mr. Tobin's did not at all exceed, the true ordinary rates of
subsistence. The question then will be, whether six pints, or
seven at the most, of whole Indian corn, or even of wheaten
flour, and about as many salt herrings per week, are enough
for the subsistence of a hard-workino- man ?

We have seen already Dr. Collins's opinion on that point.
His decisive authority, if it did not confirm the account of Mr.
Tobin, showed that it was at least sufficiently favorable to the
planters. " It is vain to conceal what we all know to be
" true, that in many of the islands they did not give more
" than six or seven pints of flour or grain, with as many her-
" rings, for a negro's weekly allowance ;" and he was so far
from thinking, like Mr. Tobin, this rate of subsistence to be
sufficient, that he treated the allowance as a scanty pittance,
such as may indeed possibly suffice " to hold soul and body
" together" for a considerable time, with men " whose only
" husijiess is to live ;" but so inadequate to sustain them under
hard labour, that he expressly ascribes to its scantiness the
shocking mortality of which he had long been a melancholy
witness. " I aver it boldly, that a great number of negroes
" have perished aiinually by diseases, produced by inanition,"*

Authority, perhaps, will be thought superfluous to prove
that such must be the effect of restricting hard-working men
in an exhausting climate, or any climate on earth, to four-
teen ounces or less of vegetable food per diem, even were it
the most nutritive and best prepared food of that description ;
whereas we have seen that six or seven pints weekly of un-
ground Indian corn or horse beans, the nutritious part of
which must weigh much less than an equal measure of flour,
are very often the subjects of this scanty allowance. 1 believe
they are much the more common.

The salt herrings can hardly be at all taken into the account

* Practical Rules, p. 87. cited moie fully supra, p. 238.

282 Of the Subsistence

as nutritious food ; nor are they considered as such by the
planters themselves. Several of them admitted, that the
herrings serve merely to give a flavour or seasoning to their
vegetable diet, when boiled into a mess, or, in the Creole
phrase, a pot. " As to the animal part of their food, (says
" Dr. Collins) the portion is small indeed, consisting of salt
" fish or herrings. Though a great deal of nourishment can-
" not be expected to reside in either of them, yet as they are
" much coveted by negroes, and impart a relish to their vege-
" tables, they cannot be dispensed with." He, therefore, in
that view alone, " as the only good purpose they answered,"
recommended the continuance of their use, only in the then
ordinary quantities ; and was of opinion, that there should
be no increase of them ; while he earnestly advised the
planters to adopt a more generous supply in the other articles
of food.* In fact, the herrings, in the state in which they are
very commonly imported, and still more when progressively
served out, often, many months after their arrival, are little
better than a mass of foetid matter, containing as little nutri-
ment as the brine in which they lie ; but the negroes are fond
of them, and the more, I believe, from that strong, and to
European organs, offensive flavour, to which use has given a
zest. They are desired chiefly, no doubt on account of the
salt, with which they are so fully impregnated, that it
forms no small part of their substance. Some travellers in
Africa tell us that this article is there in high request, and
sells in the interior for an extravagant price ; and the powerful
craving of human appetite for salt, has been noticed by se-
veral writers as an instinctive propensity, implanted in us on
account of the great usefulness of that article in the digestive
process, and its tendency to the preservation of health. I
doubt much whether the same quantity of salt in a pure state
would be less nutritive than the herrings ; but perhaps it
would not be much cheaper to the master ; and probably not
so acceptable to the slaves.

Though it may reasonably be assumed, that Mr. Tobin's
account, confirmed by the long subsequent one of Dr. Collins,

* Practical Rules, p. 115.

in the Foreign-fed Colonies. 283

was at least sufficiently favorable to the planters at large,
several of them, when called as witnesses in their own cause,
stated the ordinary allowances of grain or flour at a consider-
ably higher rate ; but on a fair review of their evidence, the
most credible general result will be found to be, that the
average of six or seven pints and as many herrings weekly,
was rather above than below the actual practice. A compa-
rison, even of the most authoritative statements, those of the
Colonial Assemblies and their public agents, variant and dis-
cordant though they were, will lead to the same conclusion.*

* See the examinationti on this subject in reports of the Privy Council
and Parliamentary Committees on the Slave Trade. The standing Q. A.
No. 5. in the former, as to the allowances of food in different colonies ;
was answered not only by their public agents here, but by many of the
Governors, Councils, and Assemblies, whose written answers were prepared
in the West Indies, and transmitted officially to the Secretary of State.

" The quantity distributed is different upon different estates ; I believe
" in none less than a pint a day and a herring to season their pots with,
" which is given to every 7nan, wo/nan, and child, on the estate, except in-
^'fants; and many of them have double allowances ; such as 7)iillvjrights,
" masons, carpenters, boilers," S)-c. (Extract from answer of Mr. Spooner,
agent for St. Christopher.)

" The quantity of food given to them varies in different plantations," ^c.

" It runs in general f7-oni four to nine pints per week, given to every negro
" except infants, whose mothers have an additional allowance for them from
" their birth, equal to one half of their own. Every negro also has from
" four to eight salted herrings, mackerel, or shads per week." — Extract from
answer of the Council and Assembly of St. Christopher.

" The quantity of grain to each negro is from eight to twelve pints ; and
" of yams and potatoes, from twenty-five to thirty per week." — Extract from
answer of the Council and Assembly oi Antigua.

" Their allowance consists of from four to eight pints per iveek of grain,
" and from four to eight he? rings furnished by the master." — Extract from
answer of the Council and Assembly of Montserrat.

" The negroes are fed at the expence of their master. The articles of
" their food are flour, pease, rice, oatmeal, Indian corn, or Guinea corn,
" together with salt provisions. In the crop-time the quantity allowed them
" varies from four to six pints of the above mentioned provisions, and six
" British herrings, or other salt provisions equivale7it thereto, per week. —
" They have likewise an unbounded licence of drinking what quantity of raw
" cane liquor they please, and two pints of boiled cane liquor are generally
" given to each negro per diem ; but out of tlie crop-time the quantity
" allowed them varies from eight to nine pints of the above provisions

284 Of the Subsistence

It will not, I presume, be doubted, that those public bodies
and officers, in their statements to the privy council, and par-
liamentary committees, made the best case that could plausi-
bly be set up by them, on this very interesting subject. Their
object was to avert the abolition of the slave-trade ; and for
that purpose they had to repel the charge that the alleged
necessity of importing new negroes in order to maintain the
labouring population, arose mainly from their over-working and
under-feeding their slaves. They were also speaking in de-
fence of their own individual conduct, as well as the credit of
their fellow-colonists at large : all the misrepresentations
therefore, in such evidence, and all i^s deceptious views and
colourings, must, in reason, be looked for on the defensive
side.

It is equally reasonable, in reviewing the evidence of self-
interested witnesses who differ in their accounts, to regard
the statements least favourable to the common self-interest,
as approaching nearest to the truth. Another observation to
which such testimony is liable, will, I am sure, be felt to be of
great weight, by those who are professionally accustomed to
the examination of evidence for the establishment of contro-
verted facts : there is a wise and equitable principle which
pervades our law of evidence, that of estimating proofs, with

"per week, icith the quantity of suit provisions before mentioned, together
" with a certain daily allowance of toddy and a ship biscuit for break-
" fast." — Answer to the same query of the Council and Assembly of Xevis.

It is in respect of the above four islands alone that I find any specifica-
tion of the quantities of imported food by those legislative bodies.

As, to consult brevity, I have not extracted the entire answers, except in the
case of Nevis, it is proper to notice that the other respondents in like manner
took credit for the cane juice and liquor in crop-time ; and most of them
also, for what the slaves, as they alleged, might earn by their own labour,
on the spots of ground allotted to them ; nor did they in general forget,
occasional distributions of grog or toddy during hard work, or some extra
allowances of salt provisions in the Christmas holidays. These paltry
make weights, have been or shall be sufficiently noticed. The allowances
may fairly be said, in a general view, to have constituted the entire sub-
sistence ; for on estates where it was in any degree aided by the advantage,
very rare in those islands, of provision-ground allotments, worthy of being
at all taketi into account, the allowances were proportionally less.

in the Foreign-J'ed Colonies. 285

I'eference to the power of proving, which the party adducing
them must possess, supposing his allegations to be true.
Hence the well-known practical rule, of distrusting, and in
many cases absolutely rejecting, a degree of evidence other-
wise sufficient, when the party offering it has better evidence
in his power, which he does not produce.

Now if Mr. Ramsay's account of the ordinary allowances
had been untrue, or if the statements of those witnesses or
writers who represented the rations of imported food as ma-
terially larger, had been correct, the one might have been
refuted, and the other established beyond dispute, by the pro-
duction of books and papers to be found in every West-India
counting-house : such as the invoices of stores shipped here
for the use of particular estates, and the accounts or abstracts
transmitted by the managers or attornies to the proprietors in
this country, from which the amount of American or other pro-
visions purchased on the spot would have appeared. Indeed,
the former alone would at that time have most commonly
sufficed ; for flour or grain, as well as all the other supplies,
were then chiefly imported from Europe. To have shewn,
even in respect of a few estates, that their annual supplies of
flour or grain, when compared with their numbers of slaves,
amounted to a given rate of subsistence per head, would have
been far more satisfactory than the loose parol estimates given
by individual planters, some of which carried the allowances
materially above the accounts that I have cited.

The agents and the West Indian Committee would of course
have been readily supplied with such documentary evidence,
had it suited their purpose to call for it ; and the individual
proprietors who were brought forward to attest their own
liberality in feeding their slaves, might have brought their
invoices and plantation accounts in their hands to support
their statements, if true.

My recent antagonist, Mr. Barclay, has noticed the exist-
ence of such evidence in this country ; and has strangely
enough affected to suppose that it is within the reach of anti-
slavery writers, or of the public at large. '' Of this truth," he
says, viz. that planters, " hoivever distressed, Jiever curtail the
" comforts of their slaves;" — (an assertion, be it remembered,
in which he is at direct variance with every man of his

286 Of the Subsistence

own party who has ever written or spoken on the subject,)
*• it is in the power of any one who wishes to satisfy himself,
" by calling on any respectable West India house in London,
•* and comparing the quantity of clothing, salt provisions, rice,
" flour, medicines, &c. furnished in prosperous times and the
" present.*"

How a man, wishing to pry into such circumstances upon
anti-slavery principles, would be received by those " respect-
" able West India houses," I leave the reader to guess : — but
that all the evidence their counting-houses could supply
would have been at the command of the West India Com-
mittee, for the support of the colonial petitions in Pailiament,
will not be doubted. Nor can we think so ill of the profes-
sional talents of the eminent counsel and solicitors by whom
the case of the petitioners was conducted, as to believe that
those sources of evidence were overlooked, while the long agi-
tated question of subsistence was depending. But " facts
" are stubborn things," and written proofs, forgery apart, in-
tractable ones. Such evidence, therefore, could not have
been safely and usefully invoked.

In one instance, abolitionists had access to a document,
being a public one, by which the parol evidence of their op-
ponents, on this very subject of imported food, was put to the
test ; and the result is very impressive. It had been stated
before the Committee of Privy Council by the agent of Ja-
maica and other gentlemen of that island, that " the common
" allowance of herrings there for the food of their slaves, was
" from twenty to twenty-five barrels per annum, for every
" hundred negroes, allages included ;" but it was found, from
official accounts of imports afterwards called for and ap-
pended to the report, that the average quantity of herrings
imported into Jamaica during the five next preceding years,
viz. from 1783 to 1787 inclusive, was only 21,089 barrels ;
which, supposing even the plantation slaves to be the only
consumers, amounted, according to their then numbers, to
less than half the quantity of the alleged consumption.
Taking into account the very large use of that article of

* P. 11, 12.

in tlie Foreign-Jed Colonies. 287

import by the poorer whites, the free coloured people and
domestic slaves, the statement was probably excessive by
two-thirds at the least.*

To this line of argument I shall have occasion to recur
when I speak of the amount of clothing, all the articles of
which are still imported from this country : though it is un-
true that the same is now the case with flour, or other vege-
table food, as Mr. Barclay insinuates. But the colonial party
have other means of supplying in all respects this remarkable
defect in their evidence by documentary proofs, as to the time
present as well as the past ; and till they do so, their parol
evidence, even were it more consistent, would weigh little in
reflecting minds.

What argument, however, can be more impressive than
Dr. Collins's too tardy discovery of the real case, in his
public appeal to the consciences of his brother planters. " It
" is in vain to conceal what we all know to be true," &.c. — Yes,
they " all knew this to be true :" yet they all long stood
as petitioners before the Privy Council and Parliament, aver-
ring and producing witnesses to prove that their slaves were
sufficiently, nay liberally and superabundantly fed ; and all
concurred in crying down before the British public, as libel-
lers and liars, those who had humanity and courage enough

* See Mr. Wilberforce's letter to his constituents of Yorkshire, 1807 ;
where these public documents are cited and discussed.

'\'^ain attempts were made in reply by the Jamaica Assembly to bolster
up this refuted falsehood, on the pretence that a large quantity, not included
in the official returns, had been imported from America ; but it was shown
in my second letter to Mr. Wilberforce in defence of his Slave Registra-
tion Bill in 1816, that the subsidiary statement, like the primary one, was
unfounded in truth.

Gladly, no doubt, would the Assembly on that occasion have supported
its own credit if possible, by adducing in its elaborate Report such written
evidence as was abundantly at hand. To have shewn from official docu-
ments, e. g. the recorded accounts of receivers or trustees, or even from
plantation books, or accounts current with consignees, that herrings had
been supplied in the alleged proportion, even on a few estates, would have
countenanced the impeached statement; and might have resolved detected
imposture into venial mistake, as to the ordinary average supply. But no
such evidence was adduced ; and it is not hard to divine the cause.

288 Of the Subsistence

to affirm the contrary. And yet the same men expect again
to be believed, when upon the same kind of evidence they
renew the same impostures. What better grounds have we
now for beUeving that the slaves, at this moment, are suffici-
ently fed, or that they are not still suffering the same terrible
consequences of inanition and hunger, that were so impres-
sively described by Dr. Collins ? If improvements, and ade-
quate improvements, in this respect have taken place, where
and when were they made ?

Subsequent writers on the colonial side have prudently
shunned the only fields in which they could be closely grap-
pled with in this branch of the controversy. They have ob-
served a discreet silence as to the amount of such improvements,
and the actual scale of subsistence, in the foreign-fed colonies,
where alone it can be ascertained, and where only we have
public evidence to refer to in respect of its former amount.
They affect to defend the planters at large, without limitation
of place, against the charge of under-feeding their slaves ;
but all their alleged facts, and all their reasonings, relate to
Jamaica, or other home-fed colonies. I am not aware, at
least, that any one apologist of the system, since the abolition
of the slave trade, has ventured to tell us what the allow-
ances from the master are in the Leeward islands, to which in
that respect the former evidence almost exclusively applied.

This omission is the more observable, especially in those
who have professed to answer my former volume, because the
strictures on this important subject contained in it, as inci-
dental to my review of the slave laws, had special reference
to the Leeward islands, and none at all to the case of the
home-fed colonies ; except by way of contrast with the liberal
sustentation at the Bahamas, where sugar was no longer
grown.*

I there shewed the insufficiency of food under which the
slaves suffered, and often perished, in five of our sugar colonies
at least, from authority not to be questioned ; that of their own
interior legislatures, convened in a general council and as-

See Vol. I. p. 93 to 100, and Appendix thereto, No. 3, p. 464 to 468.

in the Foreign-fed Colonies. 289

semhly of all the leeward islands at St. Christopher in 1798,
for the purpose of amending their slave laws ; and also the
inadequacy and failure of the enactments then made to remedy
the acknowledged mischief.

As that volume, now long out of print, will probably not
be in the possession of many who may read the present, I
subjoin the rates of allowance prescribed and expressly re-
cognised as humane and liberal ones, by an act of that legis-
lative body. They were either " 7ii7ie pints of corn or beans
"per week, or eight pints oj" pease, or wheat or ryejiour, or In-
** dian corn meal, or nine pints of oatmeal, or seveii pints of rice,
" or eight pounds of biscuit." Certain weights of native pro-
visions, not as additions, but further alternatives, were also
prescribed; and with them, or with either of these rations, one
pound and a quarter of herrings, shads, mackarel, or other
salted provisions, per week* ; and the act allowed a reduction
of one-fifth part of these scanty allowances in crop-time ; i. e.
during five months of the twelve.

We have here, therefore, a standard of what was deemed
" humane or liberal" feeding in those islands, and held out as
creditable to their meliorating code, ten years later than the
period which the witnesses whom I have cited referred to. I
may truly say, indeed, sixteen years later ; for this act was
laid before Parliament in 1804, as being amongst the best
and most recent fruits of his Majesty's recommendations to
the assemblies, pursuant to an address of Parliament of 1797,
to pass protecting slave laws ; nor am I aware, that in any
one of those islands the standard has been raised by any
subsequent law. In St. Christopher the same scale of allow-
ances was expressly re-enacted only three years ago.

As I shall have more use to make of this act in the present
division of my work, it is proper to apprize my readers of a
peculiarity attending its enactments in respect of food, which

* See the act printed with other colonial information as to meliorating
laws, by order of the House of Commons, of 8th of June, 1801, title
Leeward Islands, 15 H:

VOL. II. U

290 Of the Subsistence

distinguishes it very materially from most other parts of the
meliorating codes of the Leeward Islands, as well as of the
other sugar colonies. In those enactments, its authors, or at
least a respectable majority of them, were in earnest, and
wished to be obeyed.

The general object, indeed, of these, as of the other colo-
nial legislators, was to avert the abolition of the slave trade,
by what the West India Committee, and the agents here, had
anxiously recommended to them as the only possible means ;
the passing such laws as might, through their popular effect
in this country, paralyze the efforts of the abolitionists, by
producing a hope that slavery might be effectually mitigated
and terminated, without the abolition of the trade, or any
other parliamentary measures.* But the oppression of scanty
feeding had at that time been carried to a more than ordinary
degree of severity by many planters in those islands, especially
in St. Christopher, whose half-famished slaves had become, in
consequence, nuisances to their neighbours, by breaking their
canes for food, and other depredations. It was, therefore,
and I hope also from better motives, the sincere desire of the
more respectable members of the general council and assem-
bly to fix a minimum of the weekly allowances, on as large a
scale, and with regulations as effectual, as could be proposed
with any hope of general concurrence. But they met with an
opposition so formidable, that they were obliged, in some
measure, to give way to it ; and the scale of subsistence ulti-
mately enacted, shamefully low though it is, was not carried
without great difficulty. I have in my possession a printed

* See the resolutions of the committee, and the letters of Sir William
Young inclosing them, in papers printed by order of the House of Com-
mons of June 8th, 1804. H. 58, 59.

The General Assembly of the Leeward Islands were so far from disguising
their motives, that they thought it an essential preliminary to have a copy
of the resolutions of the West India Committee, then called " the Com-
" mittee of Planters and Merchants" in this country; and Sir William
Young's letter transmitting the same, officially laid before them ; and they
accordingly addressed the governor for that purpose, before they proceeded
to business ; as if on purpose to show that they meant to act merely in
conformity to the advice of their partizans in England. See the same
papers, H. p. 38.

in the Foreign- fed Colonies. 291

report of their deliberations, published at the time on the
spot, whereby it appears that there were many obstinate
divisions, upon motions, to reduce, by a weekly pint or two,
the scanty allowances at last adopted.

Hence alone, as I doubt not, arises the peculiar usefulness
of this act, in throwing light on the actual practice. Had its
purposes been wholly ostensible and illusory, like the ordinary
enactments of the meliorating laws, we should most probably
have found the prescribed allowances two- fold more liberal or
specious.

There was naturally, however, no objection on either side,
to take all the credit before the English public that could,
without cost, be obtained ; and therefore the preamble recited
the object to be " to compel all persons to treat their slaves
" with that humanity which is generally prevalent in these
" islands." No more can be necessary to satisfy every mind,
that the enactments were not less liberal than the best exist-
ing practice.

But scanty though those statutable allowances are, I stated,
in my former volume, that they had not in fact been given ;
and that the act had proved a dead letter, like the other
meliorating laws. I cited, in proof of it, the authority of
Mr. Caines, an eminent planter of St. Christopher, who, some
years after, had the humanity and courage, though resident
in that island, to publish a pamphlet there, stating that fact,
and remonstrating with his brother planters on the subject.
I cited further, an express admission of the Council and
Assembly of Antigua, in 1815, that the prescribed allow-
ances had not been given, and offering as an excuse for it, the
poverty of the planters ; and I added what was, if possible,
still more decisive, that the provisions of the act for securing
its own execution, by public returns on oath from the different
plantations, had, as appeared by the answers to official en-
quiries made in pursuance of a parliamentary address, been
every where, and universally neglected, from the first promul-
gation of the act, without a single prosecution for any such
default.

These statements being undenied and unanswered by my
opponents, I may surely now assume, as incontrovertible,
that in the Leeward Islands at least, the general allowances

u 2

292 Of the Subsistence.

to the slaves are still less than their own laws prescribe ; and if
so they are probably not larger than those which Dr. Collins so
strongly reprobated as cruelly and destructively scanty, viz.,
six or seven pints per week ; for if we deduct the fifth part
during five months of crop-time, from the prescribed weekly
rations of nine pints, the annual average of the legal allowances
will not exceed eight.

It is by no means necessary, however, that I should insist
on any such inferiority in the practical to the legal standard ;
for what European reader can contemplate the latter, without
compassionate and indignant emotions ? With the nutritive
powers, as human food, of some of the alternative articles, we
are, indeed, happily unacquainted in this country; but the
les:islature of the Leeward Islands havino- considered its
weekly rations of unground corn and horse beans as equiva-
lent to eight pints of flour, or eight pounds of biscuit, (i. e.
the hard and heavy ship biscuit in use by the most economi-
cal mariners, for none other is ever given to the slaves,) we
are furnished with an unexceptionable medium, whereby to
estimate the rest. The allowances, in whatever form, are
only equal to eight pints of flour, or eight pounds of ship-
biscuit weekly ; and this is the whole subsistence of hard-
working men, with the addition only of one pound and a
quarter of salt herring, which, as we have seen to be admitted,
has no nutritious value, but is used as seasoning only.

I shall hereafter compare this miserably inadequate sub-
sistence with the ordinary consumption of food by English
agricultural labourers; and also with the allowances of food
to persons who are sustained here at public expense ; and the
result will be found demonstrative of the cruel parsimony of
sugar planters, in a degree far beyond what most of my readers
may be prepared to expect. In the meantime it may be right
to remind those who have read my former volume, that the
allowances prescribed by law in the Bahamas, where the curse
of sugar planting has ceased with the capacity of the soil to
sustain it, were shown to be in comparison with those of the
Leeward Islands in the proportion of near two to one.

It is but fair to admit, in this place, that the advice of Dr.
Collins did not extend to so large an increase of the ordinary
allowances, as I shall maintain that humanity clearly required,
nor quite so large as the Bahama legislature has prescribed.

in the Foreign-fed Colonies. 293

" When your negroes are fed with an allowance, and have that
" only to depend upon, you ought not to give less than ten or
*' twelve pints a week to each grown 7iegio.''*

But it is impossible, I think, to read his work throughout
without ascribing this very abstemious exhortation to his
ordinary policy of prescribing no more costly correctives of
the existing system than such as he hoped his brother plan-
ters might be persuaded, for their own interest, to adopt. He
well knew, that, compared with the general practice, ten or
twelve pints per week would be a very important attainment
for the slave ; and he knew also, full well, how hard it would
be to reconcile the additional expence attending any such im-
provement with that rigid economy in the management of a
sugar estate, which necessity dictates to most planters, and
avarice strongly suggests to them all. The slave trade, it
should be observed, in his further excuse, was then still in
existence, and seemed to have finally triumphed over its op-
ponents. Dr. C. therefore evidently calculated upon its con-
tinuance, for which he had been, and seems still to have been,
an advocate. His advice, consequently, was adapted to a
state of things in which the preservation of the slaves was not
an object of any clearly demonstrative necessity, and he did
not hope that very costly sacrifices for the attainment of it
could be recommended with any hope of effect.

Whether this defence, or rather this explanation, of his
views be satisfactory or not, the increase of subsistence that
he advised was clearly inadequate to the demands of justice
and humanity ; though full large enough to condemn, on his
authority, the still subsisting legal standard, and still more
the actual practice, in the Leeward Islands. In proof of this
I will now add, however needlessly, to the practical legislative
estimate of the Bahamas, that of Jamaica.

In the last consolidated slave act of that island, section 69,
a regulation is made for the subsistence of slaves while con-
fined as criminals in the workhouses or gaols. The keepers
are commanded, under a penalty of ten pounds for every ne-
glect, " to provide and give to every slave a sufficient quan-

Practical Rules, p. 92.

294 Of the Subsistence

" tity of good and wholesome provisions daily, that is to say,
"■ not less than one quart of unground Guinea or Indian corn,
" three pints of the flour or meal of either, or three pints of
" wheat flour," (or substitutes needless to specify in native
vegetables) " and also one herring or shad, or other salted
" provisions equal thereto."* Comparing like articles with
like, we have here quantities from two-fold to three-fold
greater than the allowances of the Leeward Islands; and
greater by one-third, at least on a medium, than those recom-
mended by Dr. Collins, the herrings or other seasonings of
the vegetable diet excepted, which are the same in all.

Did the Jamaica legislature, in giving these at the public
expence, expressly as " sufficient quantities'^ of food, intend a
large superfluity, as a bounty to criminals ? or do men require
thrice as much food in prison, as when they are working hard
in the cane-pieces through the day ?

Before I dismiss this subject of subsistence in the foreign-
fed colonies, it may be proper to notice the resources which
" industrious" negroes were said even there to possess, for
adding to their means of subsistence, by cultivating those
mountain provision-grounds which belong to some estates, and
those small spots of broken ground which are unavoidably
left to them, even in the fully planted and dry weather Lee-
ward Islands ; and also by their gathering grass and brush-
wood for sale in the markets.

Though Mr. Tobin, in his reply to Ramsay, did not scruple
to maintain that the master's allowances, supposing them to
be no more than six pints of flour and six herrings weekly,
were enough for the slave's support, and ventured to compare
them in a way I shall hereafter remark upon, with the sub-
sistence of English labourers,t he afterwards, when examined
as a witness before the Committee of the House of Commons,
seems to have thought it expedient, like others, to take these
alleged resources of voluntary industry into the account. ;]:

* See the act in papers printed by order of the House of Commons, of
June 10, 1818.

f Cursory Remarks 59, 60.

I Commons Report of 1790, p. 236. Q. " Is the quantity of food al-
lowed to the negroes sufficient for " their support?" A. " The quantity of

in the Foieign-fed Colonies. 295

Mr. Thomas, of Nevis, made the same make-weight means
a part of his estimate.

Q. " Is the food allowed to the negroes, in your judgment,
" proper and sufficient for their support ? A. " No doubt
" the food is proper; and with regard to the quantity, I must
" say that it is a bare sufficiency for their support; but it is,
" at the same time to be understood, that no master depends
" wholly on that allowance which he weekly gives out, nor
" does the negro rely upon it, as he has many advantages if
" industrious and well disposed."*

It would be far better, I believe, for the poor slaves in the
foreign-fed colonies collectively, if these " many advantages
" of the industrious and well disposed'' had no existence. The
benetit of them, such as they are, belongs to a very few, com-
pared with the whole number of slaves ; and those few are
commonly the individuals who have the least need of them,
viz. the drivers and the other head negroes, or tradesmen ; for
these generally if not always, I believe, receive double allow-
ances*, though they have by far the lightest labours. Yet, in
the controversial use of these alleged " advantages," they are
usually magnified beyond all rational bounds, and treated as
if they were, or might be, enjoyed by the whole mass of the
plantation slaves. They have served often to veil the true
extent of the general oppression in respect of food, from the
eyes of the British people ; and from those also, perhaps, of
many proprietors resident in this country, who have no per-
sonal knowledge of the case.

What are these '^advantages?'' — Mr. Thomas, like almost
every other colonist who has condescended to specify them,
referred to the " produce of the slave's own allotment of pro-
" vision ground, his power of selling it in the markets, of
" raising hogs, goats, and poultry ;" (he might, in reference

" provisions allowed to the negroes may be sufficient for their support : but
" it is always understood, both by the master and the slave, that they are not
" to depend entirely on the provisions allowed them, but are expected to
" add something to them by their own industry."
* Commons Report of 1790, p. 250.

296 Of the Subsistence

to ordinary field negroes, as fairly have added horses and
cows,) and added, that " negroes wlio live on estates adjacent
*' to towns, have further advantages, derived from selhng grass
*' and fuel to the inhabitants."

In the latter particular he spoke more accurately and fairly
than most gentlemen of his party, for they in general would
lead their European readers to believe, that not this very
limited decription only, but all the slaves, even in the largest
colonies, have markets within reach, at which all the grass
and fuel they can collect, as well as the ground provisions
they may have to spare, and the live stock they may raise,
can always be sold. This species of delusion has probably
derived much countenance from the hasty conclusions and
reports of gentlemen who, on visiting the islands, have seen
many negroes bringing to town such articles for sale, or stand-
ing with them in the markets, without the means of knowing
that they were the slaves only of neighbouring estates, or on
whose account they sold ; and without, perhaps, reflecting
how very small the amount of such traffic must be, and how
trivial the number engaged in it, when compared with that of
the whole black population. A few further facts, and a little
plain reasoning, therefore, on this subject, may be useful.

In the first place, as, with the exceptions of grass or fodder,
and fuel, all these marketable articles must be derived from
the slaves' labours, at times allotted to himself, and on his
own allotment of provision ground, it is clear that where he
has not time and strength enough for such labours, or where
he has no productive provision ground allotted to him, these
alleged advantages, except as above, can have no existence,
be his disposition to industry what it may. Now it has been
already shown, that supposing a surplus of time and strength
beyond what are appropriated to the master's use, to be left
to the slaves for these commercial purposes of their own
(which the readers of my chapter on labour, will I trust be
satisfied cannot be the case, except with negroes of more
than ordinary vigour), the allotments of provision grounds in
the old Leeward Islands are neither large enough, nor season-
able and accessible enough, nor fertile enough, to form any
considerable basis for these advantages, or even for the most

in the Foreign-fed Colonies. 297

part to furnish the slave with any material addition to the
food so scantily supplied by the master.*

* In addition to the evidence already cited, the following may be worth
extracting. " Many of the estates,^' said the same witness last cited, " have
" no mountain ground at all; in consequence of which the proprietor gives a
" greater allowance of food." Q. " Can you say what is the greatest
" allowance given where there is no mountain ground ? " A. " The allow-
" ance out of crop-time is greater than during the crop-season ; but I believe
" eleven pints of grain per week, besides an equal number of herrings, is
" the greatest allowance." — Evidence of Mr. Thomas. Commons Report
of 1790, p. 258.

The same witness being asked " are the islands of St. Christopher and
" Nevis liable to frequent or severe droughts," — answered, " They are
" very much so ; and I believe suffered much from this cause during the
" last two years ; for during the whole eight months that I was last abroad,
"■ there fell but twice any thing of rain that might be called a hard shower."
Ibid. p. 255.

It is obviously impossible to form any general estimate of the deductions
that should be made from the resource of the provision grounds where any
such are allotted, on account of these frequent droughts, both terms being
quite indefinite; but that no material increase of allowance is commonly
given on this account is manifest, since neither this nor any other witness
distinguished it, or took it into account, even when stating the maximum of
allowance without any limitation of seasons. As Mr. Thomas stated
eleven pints to be the greatest allowance when there are no provision
grounds at all, being an increase upon his own estimate of only two ninth
parts at most, it may be confidently assumed that the increase, on account
of occasional droughts must, if any, be very small indeed.

But the act of the Leeward Islands is more decisive on this point ; for it
allows no diminution of the prescribed rations in any islands under the
government on account of the much magnified advantages in question, on
estates near the towns ; nor, except in the Virgin Islands, on account of the
provision grounds, however productive ; unless when they are " under culti-
" vation in the owner's time," i. e. when they are cultivated by the gang on
the master's account, at times that would otherwise be employed in sugar
planting. As to the Virgin Islands, where alone in that government pro-
vision grounds allotted to the slaves for their own use, are on many estates
seasonable, and considerable in point of extent, the act allows expressly on
that account, a diminution of imported or dry provisions out of crop, " in
" the proportion only of one fifth part," and that only on condition that the
owner " shall give and allow to each slave as much land and time, as shall
" with his labour thereon for such time, be likely to produce the value of
" the dry or salted provisions deducted." A proviso also is added in
respect of the same excepted i'slands, that if the value shall not be actually

298 Of the Subsistence

But I would, in the next place, and more particularly, call
the attention of my readers to the grossness of those impos-
tures which represent these poor drudges in general, as deriving
from their sales in the markets, any adequate or material
addition to the master's supplies. This resource, if some of
the colonial fabulists were believed, furnishes them with an
abundance of the comforts of life, and even its luxurious
superfluities. They grow rich even, we are gravely told, if
industrious, from this profitable marketing ! !

Supposing the commodities in a great degree attainable in
the foreign-fed, or even in the home-fed colonies, — where
are the markets for 80,000 negro chapmen in Barbadoes,
20,000 in St. Christopher, and 330,000 in Jamaica? and
whence come the buyers ?

Jamaica, as we learn from Mr. Bryan Edwards, is one
hundred and fifty miles in length, by forty miles of medium
breadth, giving an area of 3750 square miles, intersected by
high mountains ; and it contains, by the same authority,
eight towns, being about one to 469 square miles. If the
towns were equally distributed over the whole area, and each

produced, the difference shall be made good to the slave. (See sect. 2. p. 16,
of the Papers before referred to.) If in the most favoured spots of the foreign-
fed colonies, and under the most successful culture of the provision-grounds,
they supply only one-fifth of the necessary food, it was not without reason
that they were in ordinary circumstances thrown out of the account.

The same act more directly shews the insignificancy of the ordinary allot-
ments of provision-grounds in many, or most parts of the government; for
it enacts, that " Owners shall allot to every slave capable of working the
*' same, a piece or spot of good well-laying land oi forty feet square at least,
" immediately round or close to his liouse, \i the same can be done without pull-
" ing down or injuring any other negro house ; and if it cannot be so done,
" then shall allot the same quantity of land in some part of the plantation
" commodious for his working the same, provided there is so much land not
"usually planted in canes; and if not, an annual compensation of equal
" value." (Same Act, sect. 6.)

Negro houses are usually placed in the driest parts of the estate. Let
the reader then add to these views the frequent droughts destructive of all
vegetation, 6x(iept that of the hardy sugar-cane ; and Mr. Baillie's admission
that " provision grounds do not answer in those islands more than one year
" in three ;" and he will be able to estimate the value of this boasted resource
of industry, which is the necessary basis of all the rest, excepting only the
trivial supply of a neighbouring town with firewood and grassv

in the Foreign-fed Colonies. 299

town centrical to its respective district, (the reverse of which
may be seen by inspecting any map of the island, for the towns
are all upon, or very near the coast) still it must be manifest
that a very small proportion only of the estates could be so
near to any town, as to make it possible for the slaves to walk
to it with their merchandize, and return, even on the Sabbath,
supposing also the whole of that day to be at their own dis-
posal for the purpose.

I will follow the same author in some other statistics of a
more changeful kind, not knowing that they are to be found
ni the work of any more recent opponent.

Mr. Edwards has furnished us with the numbers of houses
contained in five of the eight towns he mentions ; apparently
not thinking the remaining three worth the same notice.
Port Royal he stated to contain about two hundred houses ;
Savannah-la-Mar, from sixty to seventy ; Montego Bay, two
hundred and twenty-five ; Falmouth, including two adjoining
villages, two hundred and twenty ; and Kingston, the chief
town, the importance of which he extols, 1666. If they were
all cast together, they would not exceed in extent many a
market-town in this country.

But let us next look at his account of their free population.
That of Kingston alone was given by him, and he stated it to
be 6639 whites, and 3280 free coloured people.

If we suppose the other towns, the houses in which are
given, to have been peopled in an equal proportion to the
buildings, we shall have about 14,017 free inhabitants of towns
of all ages ; with a small surplus for the three other towns^
whose houses are not numbered. Let the whole be taken at
15,000, and every man, woman, and child among them sup-
posed to be a customer at the Sunday markets ; then taking
the slaves, as they were estimated at the same period, by the
same authority, only at 250,000, we shall have, instead of
many buyers to support a single chapman, near seventeen
chapmen to serve a single weekly buyer.

If we look at the statistics of other colonies, as furnished
in the same volume, the case will be found no better. Every
where the free inhabitants of the towns are too few to make
their common demand for articles sold in the negro-markets
exceed the supply from adjacent or neighbouring estates ;

300 Of the Subsistence

though the superior or abler slaves of those estates, are,
generally speaking, the only sellers, except a few from more
distant parts on Sundays.

To regard this marketing, therefore, as a resource import-
ant to the whole mass of plantation slaves throughout the
respective colonies, would be to adopt a very gross delusion.

The articles brought to town by the slaves for sale on their
own account, are chiefly, and except on Sundays, exclusively,
grass, fodder, and brushwood for fuel ; all of which their ne-
cessities commonly oblige them to sell at prices oppressively
low. A large bundle of either, laboriously collected and car-
ried on the head to town at nightfall, after the toils of the
day, will produce perhaps to the weary bearer, less than
three-pence sterling.

As to the vegetables and fruit, fowls or other live stock,
that are seen on sale by negroes, either in their market-place
or elsewhere, on any other day of the week than Sunday, it
may be with certainty concluded that the goods belong to the
masters ; and are sold on their account.

The following extract, from the evidence of Sir Ashton
Warner Byam, may serve suflBciently to confirm these re-
marks. Q. " How are persons residing in the towns of the
" different islands, and who have no plantations, supplied
" with grass, fodder, and vegetables ? " A. " The slaves of
*' the neighbouring plantations bring grass and fodder every
" evening after their hours of work, to the towns for sale, for
" their own benefit ; and vegetables are brought by the slaves
" to market on Sundays, for their own benefit; but on the
" other days we purchase vegetables from the slaves, sent in
" by the proprietors of gardens, to be sold for their master's
" benefit."* It may be added, that no small number of
negroes, who are seen as sellers, even in the Sunday markets,
are notoriously the agents of their managers or overseers ;
and a still larger proportion are selling for the drivers, and
other head negroes, of the estates from which they come.

But to recur to the impracticable distance of the markets,
that undenied, and undeniable obstacle to their use by a great
proportion of the slaves in every colony.

* Commons' Report of 1790, p. 106.

in the Foreign-fed Colonies. 301

No witness, and no writer, to my knowledge, has pretended
that this circumstance is taken into account, so as to increase
the allowances of slaves where the market is remote. Sir
John Orde, indeed. Governor of Dominica, in his evidence
before the Privy Council, noticed that such a difference was
just. " In an island," he says, " where some have not a foot
" of land to spare near their estates, and others the greatest
" quantity ; where some are near a market, and others can
" scarce possibly get at one, it would be hard, perhaps, to
*^ oblige all owners to give the same food to their slaves," *
Certainly, if enough was given, where there was no ground or
market, there might have been some diminution where there
was a concurrence of both. But I have shewn the insuffi-
ciency of the ordinary allowances, except when aided by these
" advantages," to have been admitted ; and yet it was not pre-
tended that the ordinary rations were increased in the absence
of them. One or two witnesses only alleged a small increase,
when provision grounds were wanting, or unproductive; but
not one of the many, who defined those rations, asserted that
they were greater on estates distant from a market. The act of
the Leeward Islands too which allows for the one, is quite silent
as the other; and it allows for provision grounds, in the way
only of diminution, from the prescribed subsistence where they
are, not by any addition where they are not, possessed. It is a
pregnant proof of how little these boasted marketing advan-
tages were in the minds of those who could estimate them
best, that the vicinage of a town was not at all taken into
account in framing such a law.

The fact is, that the colonists, throughout the whole of this
painful controversy, have practised that species of unfairness,
which they impute without reason to their opponents. They
accuse us perpetually of raising an unjust prejudice against
them, by citing particular instances of cruelties, which, as they
allege, are very rare. Our answer, to which no sound reply
has ever been given, is, that our means of proving them only,
not the facts themselves are rare, and that considering the
systematical exclusion of all the natural evidence of such
facts, and all fair means of their public investigation, the

* Privy Council Report, title Dominica, Q. A. 5.

302 Of the Subsistence

proof of a few, makes in a high degree probable the existence
of very many.

They, on the other hand, never fail to generalize every
alleviation of slavery that circumstances, however partial or
particular, may produce. If a few drivers or tradesmen ac-
quire a little property, it is brought forward as a proof, that
the field negroes in general possess, or may by industry acquire
it ; if an odious character is under peculiar circumstances,
and for some atrocious cruelty towards his slaves, brought to
justice, they blazon it as a proof that protecting slave laws in
general are fairly executed ; and in the present instance the
local occasional advantages of a few, are made a cloak for a
starving parsimony towards the many.

Should these frivolous attempts to disguise or extenuate the
cruel oppression prevalent in the foreign-fed colonies as to their
scanty allowances, be thought worth any further answer, let
it be observed, that Dr. Collins, to whom the nature and
amount of these pretended aids of the subsistence given by
the master were well known, considered them as too trivial,
partial, and uncertain, to be worth any distinction or excep-
tion, either in his strictures on the existing scantiness of the
master's allowances, or in his estimate of their necessary in-
crease. Had they formed any ordinary or general resource,
he could not have reasoned as he did on the famishing insuf-
ficiency of the weekly rations of " six or seven pints of flour or
" grain, with as mani/ salt herrings" regarding them as the
only nutriment; nor could he have asserted, as he solemnly
did, on his own " melancholij experience, that a great number of
tt jiegroes perished, annually by diseases produced by inanitionJ"

I will here conclude my account of that second grand head
of general oppression under which these hapless fellow-crea-
tures labour and perish, a distressful penury of food.

I might justly add to it very serious strictures on the
quality of their provisions ; for few I believe will suppose a
diet wholly vegetable, well fitted to sustain the strength, and
give full permanent support to the constitutions, of hard-
working men ? The proper or necessary quantity of admix-
ture of animal food is a different question ; but it may fairly
be said, without any material qualification, that the common
field-negroes have none at all ; for as to the wretched modicum

in the Foreign-Jed Colonies. 303

of salt herring, or the brine it is dissolved in, we have seen,
that even the apologists of the system admit it to be of no
nutritious value, and to serve only as seasoning to the vegetable
messes which they boil. The pretence that they frequently eat
animal food of their own raising, such as fowls and pork, if
applied to the common field-negroes, is not only false but pre-
posterous ; nor have many of my opponents ventured to
suggest it, even when raising and exaggerating to the utmost
every actual or occasional resource. It is true, that the head-
negroes, who have double allowances, and possess various ad-
vantages besides, sometimes have a fowl or two, a pig, sheep
or goat of their own raising; but even with them it would be
deemed a strange extravagance to feed on such costly luxuries.
They dispose of them in the markets ; and buy more necessary,
or at least cheaper articles, with the price. As to Mr. Bar-
clay, who gravely places in the ordinary bills of fare of the
Jamaica slaves in general, /ish, and land-crabs, I will leave
the reply to those who may think Gulliver or Munchausen
worthy of serious refutation. From such fables, however, we
may learn the consciousness of their authors, that the want
of animal food was a hardship not easy to defend.

But supposing vegetable food alone to suffice, the kinds of
it most commonly allowed to the slaves are indefensibly bad.
I remember well, that when, during a scarcity and apprehen-
sion of famine in this country, the poor were in many places
reduced to eat potatoes and rice, as partial substitutes for
wheaten bread, their common complaint was, that such food,
" though it filled the stomach, was not hearty enough to work
upon." How much less substantial the horse-beans, or un-
ground Indian corn, or the wild yams, coUaloo or spinage, the
ochras, or other flimsy flatulent vegetables, on which the poor
hard-worked negro is often driven to subsist, without any fa-
rinaceous food at all.

That men and women so subsisted, while working sixteen
hours in the twenty-four, should neither maintain their num-
bers, nor live out half their days, can excite no surprise :
but it may reasonably be a subject of wonder, that the loss by
mortality among them is not much greater than it is ; or rather
than it appears to be. If we had returns of the black popu-
lation, distinguishing the common field-negroes, from the less-

304 Of the Subsistence in the Foreign-fed Colonies.

worked and better-fed part of the plantation gangs, and from
the domestic slaves, the loss would be found much better
proportioned to the power of the producing causes than the
miserably defective register acts now enable us to discover.

But there are in our patient and plastic natures, means
of accommodation to the pressure of necessity, far beyond
what without experience would be easily believed. Witness
the long fasts, during the laborious hunting excursions, of the
North American Indians ; and the preservation of ship-
wrecked mariners, who have lived for weeks on a morsel of
biscuit to each man per day. It is not strange then that, with
the important aid of habit early or slowly formed, slaves have
been brought to live long and work hard, under such a penury
of food as has been here described. Happily perhaps for the
lower classes in civilized society, it has not yet been ascer-
tained by experiment, in the case oi free persons, how much
labour, with how little food, human nature may be trained to
endure for many successive years ; or even in vigorous frames,
for the ordinary term of life. But this problem has in the
sugar colonies been practically solved ; and I have here given
the sad results of its solution.

301

Section VI. — The Subsistence of the Slaves shewn from com-
parative views to be extremely scanty and inadequate.

Having now shewn what is the ordinary amount of food
allowed to the slaves, when they depend wholly on the mas-
ter's allowances for their support, I proceed to demonstrate
more clearly its great and cruel insufficiency.

This to most of my readers may appear a superfluous task;
but so imposing has been the hardihood of misrepresentation
by the colonial party on this subject, that its further exposure
may be useful. They have alleged, as I have shewn, not only
that the sustentation of the slaves is copious and liberal, but
that it is more so than that of the labouring poor, in this and
other European countries ; and have found gentlemen of
high character to support by their public testimony, those
extravagant propositions. Let me shew then how widely
they are refuted in those statements, both positive and com-
parative, by the data now established.

For this purpose, I will first compare the amount of the
weekly allowances by the master, where the slaves are sub-
sisted in that mode, with the ordinary consumption of agricul-
tural labourers in this country ; next with that of other de-
scriptions of persons, who are fed by rations at the public
expense ; and afterwards with the subsistence, of slaves in
other countries, or under other circumstances, as far as I can
find satisfactory information on that subject. The comparison
cannot be extended in so direct a manner to the home-fed
colonies ; because the quantum of food obtained by slaves
who raise their own provisions, cannot be ascertained, or re-
duced to an^r probable average. But I refer to the reasons
already given for believing, that though the case from local
circumstances is, in a general view, probably not so bad in
Jamaica, or perhaps in some other colonies of that description,
as where the subsistence is immediately and wholly a charge
on the planter's purse, the same avaricious principle, by with-
holding a sufficient allowance of time, and exhausting the
strength of the slaves in forced labour for the master, pro-
duces in a great degree the same oppressive effects.

VOL, II. X

306 The Insitlfkieiicy of the Subsistence

I have noticed before, that Mr. Tobin defended the weekly
allowances, on the assumption that they did not average more
than six pints of corn or meal, and six herrings ; and main-
tained that such subsistence was equal to that which an
English labourer could purchase by his weekly earnings.
My readers must be curious to know how so strange a pro-
position was made out; and I will, therefore, give the argu-
ment in his own words.

" A negro for himself, his wife and four children, receives
" thirty-six pints of flour, &c. and thirty-six herrings. The
" labourer earns six shillings a week to support himself, his
" wife and his four children. With his six shillings he purchases
'* a bushel of wheat; he carries it to the mill, and brings home
" two-thirds, or say even three-fourths, of it in flour. He has
" therefore at most, but forty-eight pints of flour to divide
" among his family ; or two pints a week each more than the
" negro ; which difference is amply made up by the negro's
" herrings." *

Strange enough is this mode of comparing the two cases ;
and stranger still the premises tacitly assumed for the purpose.
The simplest, if not the only fair subjects of comparison, ob-
viously would have been the quantum of food allowed to one
working slave, and the value in subsistence of the wages
earned by one free labourer. To resort to the cases of fami-
lies, therefore, was at best needlessly to embarrass the ques-
tion ; but it was certainly highly convenient and necessary
for the author's purpose, to multiply the slave's rations six-
fold, by assigning to him a wife and four children all too
young for work, and to reduce the food of the freeman derived
from his wages in the same proportion, by assigning to him
a like family. If such cases were the most ordinary ones in
either country, or equally common in both, the selecting them
for the purposes of this comparison might not have been un-
fair; but even in England, the labourers who have wives and
four children under the age of work are comparatively few ;
and in the West Indies it would be a large estimate to say
that it is the case of one field-negro in a thousand ; as the
known state of their population may suffice to prove. In re-

* Cursory Remarks, p. 60.

sheivnjroiu comparative Views. 307

gard therefore to the ordinary case of the labouring classes,
in both countries, the comparison was irrelevant as well as
deceptions. But it was built also on groundless assumptions.
A labourer's family here, comprising so many young children,
rarely if ever depends on the father's wages alone for sup-
port. If the wife and children cannot contribute to it, the
parish for the most part does so. In many or more districts,
the havino; even two children under the working aae, consti-
tutes systematically a claim on the overseers.

The assumption on the other side of the account, that the
planter multiplies his allowances to his slave, when a father,
by the number of his family, giving him, in addition to his
own weekly rations, equal ones for the wife and every child,
was still more unfounded. No such practice does, or ever did
exist ; and I recollect no assertion of it by any witness, or any
other writer, on the colonial side. The most that is done, or
alleged to be done, in such cases, is the giving some additional
allowance to the mother, and even this I believe is rare, except
when she has an infant to suckle.

Few comparatively among the common field-negroes have
wives, or women recognised and steadily cohabiting with
them as such ; and when they have, the wife receives her own
allowance without the husband's intervention or controul.
She commonly works as hard as he does ; and requires an
equal measure of subsistence ; nor can he derive any benefit
from her allowances, unless she chooses to aggravate her
own wants, by the voluntary alleviation of his. As to the
weaned children in foreign-fed colonies, they are most com-
monly fed, till of an age for work, by the master, and not the
parents. Their food is generally prepared for them in the
way that is called " j)ot feeding," by a nurse or old woman
appointed to take care of them, who receives the materials
from the stores. But even where the practice is different, the
parents can derive no benefit from a child's allowance, which
is as much less than an adult's, as its necessities are estimated
to permit.

These statements, it should be observed, relate only to the
foreign-fed colonies, where the slaves depend on the master's
rations for support. But so did Mr. Tobin's also. Would his
premises, however, or his comparison, have been more sustain-

X 2

308 Tke Insufficiency of the Subsistence

able, if applied to colonies where the slaves raise their own sub-
sistence from the provision-grounds ? By no means. On the
contrary, the case there is still worse in respect of slaves who
have children too young for work ; because the father or mother,
or both, if they would not see their infants in want of food, must
raise enough for them as well as themselves, none being allowed
by the master, and no additional time being given to the parents
on that account. I venture to state these two last facts on
private information only ; but such as I can entirely rely upon.
It cannot be expected that I should be able to cite the express
evidence of opponents for every negative proposition ; and here
the information seems to me not only very credible in its na-
ture (for where the only stores that the planter provides for
his slaves in general are salt herrings, it would be highly in-
convenient and troublesome to purchase vegetable food for
the daily use of the children alone), but to derive strong con-
firmation from the silence of colonial witnesses and writers on
this subject. The same persons who have admitted, in general
terms, as to Jamaica and other home-fed colonies, that the
slaves raise all their own provisions, herrings excepted, would
not have omitted to add the exception of food purchased for
the children, or to inform us that the parents were allowed
extra time to raise it for them, if such had been the case ; but
I find neither of these practices any where taken credit for ;
or any distinction made between slaves who have, and those
who have not families, as to the time allowed them for what
is called '' working for themselves."

But let us return to Mr. Tobin's comparison: — the only
one that has descended from vague generalities into specifica-
tions with which it is possible to grapple.

To find fault with his assumed rate of wages, may seem
hardly worth while ; but wages, I conceive, were averaged too
low at six shillings, though he took wheat at six shillings a
bushel. The author also took care to add in a note that the
price was sometimes as high as eight or nine shillings ; but
omitted to notice that wages commonly rose in proportion.
The part of England, with the agricultural state of which I
am best acquainted, the north-western districts of Buck-
inghamshire, is one in which the condition of the farmers
and their labourers, is, from -the general poverty of the soil,

shetvn from comparative Views. 309

and other known causes, rather below, tlian above, the average
of the kingdom at large ; yet there, while I write, wheat is
at about six shillings a bushel, and full wages at nine shil-
lings a week. If these proportions be not more than com-
monly in the labourer's favour, Mr. Tobin's premises were in
this respect also erroneous, to the extent of no less than one-
third part : he should have allowed to the English labourer a
bushel and a half, instead of a bushel per week, as what his
wages might purchase.

To his proposition, that the wheat, when reduced into flour,
will lose one-fourth of its bulk, T object only the manifest in-
consistency of his not making any such deduction from the
negro's allowance ; though this, as we have seen, even on his
own authority in his parliamentary evidence, consists often of
Guinea or Indian corn, and other unground grain; and fre-
quently, as other planters admitted, of horse-beans.

But my readers will probably think that errors of one-third
and one-fourth part, might well have been left unnoticed,
after those gigantic ones which multiplied the slave's allow-
ance by six, and divided by the same number the produce of
the free labourer's wages, affecting the comparison as between
single men, in the ratio of twelve to one. Had his premises
and reasoning been correct, the consequences would strangely
have been, that in his English family case, there would have
been too little food by five-sixths ; or too much in his West
India family case, in the same proportion ; but as to the un-
married labourers in the respective countries, the contrast,
very adversely to his purpose, would have been inverted. In
England, each single labourer would have gained enough to
feed six mouths ; in the West Indies, enough only for his
own.

Mr. Tobin's criterion, however, if fairly applied to the clearly
intelligible case of single men, is one of the simplest and best
that can bo found to determine, either in a positive or com-
parative view, the sufficiency of the slave's subsistence. I will
therefore endeavour to ascertain more truly and accurately
than he did, the nutritious value of the slave's allowances on
the one hand, and the quantity of like nutriment that the free
nuui may purchase with his wages on the other. What the

310 The Insufficiency of the Subsistence

latter does purchase, and consume, is a different consideration,
but one which I shall afterwards notice.

The first step in such an enquiry is to reduce, if we can, the
nutritious value of the food in both cases, to a known and
common standard ; which must be that of wheat flour ; being
the article on which our labourers are chiefly fed, and which
alone is sometimes common to them and the slaves ; and the
nutritive value of which also, we well know from experience in
this country. This problem however, cannot be easily solved,
so as to do full justice to my own side of the controversy ; not
only because the horse beans, and the unground Indian or
Guinea corn, &,c,, are here unknown as articles of human food,
but because the colonial evidence leaves it wholly uncertain in
what proportions respectively to the flour those articles con-
stitute the ordinary rations of the slaves. I must in conse-
quence be content to rely on evidence by which the colonial
side of the question was, as there is every reason to believe,
unduly and greatly favoured.

The act of the Leeward Islands, as we have seen, takes
nine pints of whole corn or beans, as equivalent to eight pints
of wheat flour ; for in professing to enforce the adequate sub-
sistence of slaves, that was the ratio in which the act allowed
the different articles to be commuted, at the masters' election,
for each other. This, I conceive, to have much disparaged the
flour; for I cannot believe that a pint of unground Guinea
corn, Indian corn, or beans, can yield as much nutriment to
the human frame within one ninth part, as a pint of wheaten
flour separated from the bran !

I will adhere, however, to my ordinary rule of not taking
into my calculations any thing that I cannot support by colo-
nial authority. Let it be supposed therefore that the allow-
ances, in whatever form given, are equal in point of nutrition
to eight ninth parts of so much wheat flour. I will be content
further to sujjpose that the number of pints given weekly, on
an average of all seasons of the year, is seven ; which being a
pint per diem, will simplify computation, and I will waive the
deduction of one ninth part, since it cannot be ascertained in
what degree corn and beans constitute the food. On the
other hand let the salt herring, as for reasons already given it
fiirly may, hv. fairly thrown out of the account. Let it be

sheivti from comparative Views. 311

supposed then that the slaves in the foreign-fed colonies
receive, on an average, a subsistence equal to fourteen ounces
of wheaten flour per diem; for this is the utmost weight of a
pint of flour.

What proportion, let us next enquire, does this bear to the
quantity of the sam